Naturally
by When.You.Know.You.Know
Summary: [Re-Uploaded due to popular demand after taking it down in Jan] - Following immediately after the tragic events on Isla Nublar in 2015, Owen and Claire just want time to adjust to their new reality of PTSD and whatever romantic tension is going on between them. But heightened media attention and insistence from The Board that they return to the island gives them no time to adjust.
1. Coffee Stains & First Impressions

**A/N:**

 **Many of you will remember this fic when I originally wrote it a couple of years ago. I took it down at the beginning of the year because I needed to clear some personal stuff that I'd included the A/N section.**

 **But to coincide with the release of Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom (and because I've had several people PM-ing me on here to find out why I'd taken it down in the first place, I've reuploaded it both on here and on my AO3 account.**

 **Now, unfortunately I've had a comment on AO3 from someone to say that THEY had written this fic originally in Spanish and it is apparently currently "on their WattPad" and that I have apparently taken it from their WattPad account, miraculously translated it, and posted it on here..**

 **Now, I have scoured WattPad to find it so I can report them but I can't seem to find it (probably because it's in Spanish). So if any of you understand Spanish (because unfortunately I don't), could you please PM me the link to MY work that this person has translated WITHOUT my permission, that'd be awesomesauce :)**

 **Enjoy re-reading followers. And thanks, as always, for the reviews and comments and PMs of support!**

* * *

"So what do we do now?" he heard her ask, the tone of her voice matching the way she looked. Tired. No, exhausted. Uncertain. Her red hair that had once been meticulously straightened and shaped now lay around her head, tangled and shiny from the humidity. Her porcelain skin was scuffed and dirty. And he looked into her green eyes that glistened, the tears welling up from inside her.

"Probably stick together. For survival." He watched her face soften as he gave her the smallest of smirks and a little wink, before turning to his left and ever so slowly walking towards the open doors of the hanger they were stood in. All around them were survivors from Isla Nublar, the island that played home to what had been one of the most famous theme parks in the world: Jurassic World. It would now be famous for different reasons. He waited, peering over his right shoulder, knowing she would follow, and sure enough he saw her looking down at her feet fleetingly as a smile crept across her face. She turned to her right and began slowly walking towards the open doors of the hanger, walking at his pace. He knew she would've liked his response.

He dared to look to his right, watching her as she walked timidly with him. It suddenly occurred to him that when she asked him what they would do now, it had been spoken so softly it almost didn't match the bossy Claire Dearing that had arrived at his bungalow twenty hours earlier. The mere handful of times she had ever asked him a question in the past it had either been barked at him to the point that it sounded more like an order, or it had been said in such a disapproving or sarcastic tone it were as though she was asking the question rhetorically knowing that any answer he gave would never be good enough. Yet this time was different. She had genuinely asked him a question because she really didn't have any idea what to do. And she had used the word "we". As though they were a team. As though they had been through so much together over the past twenty hours that it was impossible to imagine the next twenty hours apart. He saw her look over at him, the smile still on her face. A tired smile. But still, it was a smile. And for the first time in a very long time he didn't turn away the moment her eyes locked with his.

Owen sidled up to the coffee cups that stacked neatly beside a coffee machine. As he pressed the button for a latte he took time to look at the room he was in and the people around him. He felt uncomfortable being in the presence of so many individuals in smart attire. If he owned a suit he probably would've worn it. Ah who was he kidding? He shoved a couple of sachets of sugar into his cargo pants pockets.

Two years ago he had been approached by Simon Misrani , a successful businessman. A billionaire businessman, who had had Owen's name passed to him by Owen's head of military. Misrani had offered Owen the opportunity to leave the military in favour of joining his currently thriving business venture, the world's only fully functioning Dinosaur Park. Owen had of course heard about Jurassic World. Who hadn't? It was one of the most famous and biggest attraction parks ever made. Misrani had offered him the opportunity to become the very first raptor trainer in the world. Owen had been sceptical at first, having always believed that animals should never be bred for entertainment purposed, but after several more meetings, after looking through several plans and timelines, and Misrani giving his word that the park was there for more educational purposes, he had agreed to take on the position. It was very well paid, and Owen accepted the position with his own terms. He didn't want to live in a posh apartment in the park. And he called the shots when it came to the raptors. Simon Misrani agreed to his terms, and three months later Owen moved to Isla Nublar , ready to take on his new challenge.

Two years had passed since then, and Owen had a nice little bungalow by one of the island's many lakes located away from the park, that he'd designed himself and his boss had funded. He had a sturdy truck, a good wedge of savings, and a job he loved. Not bad for thirty years old. The only downside to his job role was that every so often he had to attend a meeting with the managers of the park. And the investors. Meetings he often forced his second in command, Barry, to go to. This time however Misrani had insisted that both Owen and Barry attend this mandatory meeting. It was the biggest meeting of the year apparently, with management, co-ordinators, investors, and heads of each attraction gathering together to discuss how the year had gone and how the next year was expected to go. The raptors were the only dinosaurs who were fully grown that weren't expected to be ready to show to the public. Their unpredictable nature meaning that training them was more challenging than Simon and even Owen himself had ever anticipated.

Now Owen stood in a large smart room, in front of the coffee machine, and spotted Misrani from across the room, chatting to a middle aged man, and seemingly introducing him to a tall woman with short, dark cropped hair followed by a young woman who shook his hand with a soft smile on her face. Owen froze, his heart jolting as his eyes remained on the woman, her long red hair clipped into a neat bun at the back of her head. He knew who the first woman had been. Letitia Karelia was the fierce Senior Park Operation and Assets Manager who controlled the day-to-day running of the park along with keeping tabs on the progress of the park's assets old and new. She always wore black with a lick of deadly red lipstick on her lips, her short dark hair always seemed the same length and never moved its position. Ever. She had the nickname 'Cruella' among staff, though she didn't know it. She was in her late forties, early fifties, which confirmed what everyone suspected, that her hair was dyed. The second woman Owen had never seen before. She seemed to be in her early thirties like him, and while to many she seemed confident Owen was very good at reading people's body language. She was terrified. She must be new. Her petite figure was hugged by a smart white dress and white jacket. Her feet wrapped at the toes by some pristine white heels. He smiled to himself, rolling his eyes as he turned back to the coffee machine, grabbing a new cup and pressing the 'mocha' button. If the woman was one for wearing white in a theme park like this he imagined it wouldn't stay white for long. Unless of course she was one of these women who remained behind a computer screen and refused to get out into the field.

Owen placed a lid on each coffee cup, picked up a stirrer and turned to walk back to his colleague and friend, Barry, who had been cornered by an investor who was fascinated by the raptors. Owen's heart sank as he collided with a figure, knocking the coffees over himself and the other person. And to his dismay it was the red haired beauty he had seen across the room a moment earlier. She had clearly come over to get a coffee. He laughed awkwardly, expecting her to do the same, after all she had seemed to have a kind face. But the young woman's face went pink, and she looked livid, as her once white dress now boasted mixed mocha/latte stains down it.

"What the hell!" She yelled angrily at him. Owen was so taken aback at her reaction he was lost for words. "Seriously? You're going to laugh? How old are you?!" He watched her storm out of the room, choosing to ignore the amused looks of the people she passed, one in particular being the figure of Barry, shaking his head in disbelief at Owen who still stood frozen to the spot, giggling while holding two empty cups in his hands.

The men made the coffee again, and as they placed the lids on their cups the group were invited by Mr Misrani to take a seat in front of the small stage he was stood on. As the presentation went into full flow Owen began to lose interest, screen presentations never having been his favourite form of education. His eyes were drawn to the side of the room, and he watched as the young woman snuck her way to the front row of the audience, waving her apology to Mr Misrani who nodded in response before continuing. She took a seat beside Letitia, appearing to wearing a new white dress. At least Owen presumed it was a new dress. Though this one she wore now was also white. So it was a mystery as to whether she had cleaned it in the bathroom or just changed outfits. He could almost hear the older woman's tut from where he was sat.

The presentation had been boring and Owen felt as though he knew nothing more to begin with than he had done before, mostly because he felt that most of the information didn't effect himself, his team, or his raptors. The only thing he now knew was that the beautiful red head he'd literally bumped into earlier was called Claire, and as he'd first presumed was relatively new to the park. She had been hired as second in command to Letitia. Her presentation had been far slicker that Misrani's , confirming to Owen that she was probably one to hide behind a computer. Her presentation had shown far too many statistics for his liking. So instead of actually listening to what she'd had to say, he'd taken it upon himself to simply stare at her eyes. And her ass. Which turned towards him each time she motioned to the presentation screen. Which was conveniently often.

While chucking coffee over her wasn't his normal move to meet a girl, there was no way this Claire would be unable to remember who he was. And it was because of that that he felt no nerves approaching her at the end of the presentation. He waded his way through the group of business types who stood talking about the park, its attractions, and its potential for innovation and profits. He saw her look over at him as he approached her, and the man who had been speaking to her politely ended his sentence and walked away.

Owen noticed Claire had folded her arms, looking him up and down as he stopped in front of her with a smirk on his face. Her face had returned to the soft smile she had once had on her face when she had been watching Mr Misrani talk to the middle aged gentleman and Letitia before the coffee-incident.

"You're not here to spill more coffee down me I hope." Her voice was tainted with sarcasm and Owen couldn't help but laugh before holding his hands up innocently, indicating that he was not carrying any hot drinks this time around. Her expression didn't change, but she raised her eyebrows briefly in acknowledgement of the lack of coffee cups.

"I'm really sorry about that." He could tell she wanted to smile. He could even see the corner of her mouth twitch. But so far everything was telling him that she was quite a challenging and stubborn character. "I'm Owen by the way."

Owen held his hand out, and Claire took it, shaking it firmly before replying with her own name. The way she said her name had Owen in a sort of trance. Her voice was resolute and clear, with every word she spoke being so well enunciated that he imagined she had probably gone to some sort of finishing school. Or that she was the youngest sister of several siblings and had had to make herself known in her own way.

"Listen, I don't normally do this…" Owen began, shuffling his weight gently from one foot to another, as he noticed Claire bringing her arms down. Her eyebrows were raised again and he thought he saw her roll her eyes.

"Of course you don't…" She interrupted him. She sounded unimpressed, but the smile was still etched into the corner of her mouth, so he laughed slightly, continuing where he had been stopped: "Can I buy you a coffee as a way of apologising?"

"The coffee is free here." She was sharp, so sharp that Owen rolled his eyes.

"Well fine, can I buy you lunch then?"

"It's a free buffet lunch today." She was enjoying this, Owen could tell, as the smile in the corner of her mouth had grown.

"Well fine, can I buy you dinner then? To say sorry." He could tell that she enjoyed her own responses, her smile having grown a little more as the tone of his voice oozed exasperation. He had never had a girl make him work to ask her out before and he loved the challenge. He watched as the young woman shrugged, but nodded.

"Yeah, okay. What's your email?" She reached into her handbag to take out a large diary but paused when Owen laughed:

"I don't have an email. I don't even have the internet!"

"Cell number?" Owen shook his head at her question and he watched as Claire's smile faded and she rolled her eyes: "Okay, well, when do you want to take me out for dinner?"

"I was thinking tonight?"

"Tonight?" Owen got the feeling she wasn't one for spontaneity, and the red head scrambled through the pages of her diary until she landed on the current day. "I…yes…I can do any time from 7."

"7 it is." Owen saw the woman scribble his name in her diary with the fountain pen, before looking back up at him with her green eyes.

"Where shall we go?"

"I thought we could just meet at a bar and see where the night takes us?" He tried to stifle a laugh at the look of horror on Claire's face at the idea of a spontaneous date. He continued, hoping to keep her interested in the idea of going out with him for dinner, "Okay well how about I meet you at the docks? You'll be getting the ferry back over to Rica right?"

"Er…" She didn't seem as sure in her response as she had been with anything she had said before, and Owen wondered if she lived on Isla Nublar like he did. But before he could ask her, Letitia called her name out over the heads of other businessmen, beckoning for the young woman to follow her. So Claire looked back to Owen with a small smile: "See you at the docks at 7 then, Owen." And with that, the red head walked away from Owen, whose smirk had become dreamy-like, her words soothing into his ears and whirring in his brain.


	2. Rocking Chair, Wine, & the Stars

The couple reached the hanger doors, blinking into the sun as it smothered their dirty skin with its rays. Sticking together was all very good Claire thought, but what could they do right now? Now that they had the opportunity to leave for the day, what would they do? Each time she blinked, her body screamed at her to lay down, to give it the chance to rest. She no longer had her nephews with her. She no longer needed to be strong for them. And now that she no longer needed to be strong for them, she had the chance to be strong for herself. Except…she had no strength left. She could just about stand in an upright position, but she couldn't even raise her hand up to her eyes to block the sun and look at their surroundings.

She felt her hand being taken, and she looked over to her left at Owen who squeezed her hand slightly with his. To her surprise she let out a heavy shuddering sigh, realising that he felt the same as her. Sure they had each other for the moment, but they had no idea what to do, or where to go. They both jumped as they heard a voice behind them:

"So this is the Owen I've been hearing all about?" Claire rolled her eyes as she saw the owner of the voice, her older sister Karen, join them along with her sons and husband.

"Depends what you've heard." Claire couldn't help but grin again at Owen's response. She would have never dared respond like that to a stranger's rhetorical question, but that was Owen's style. The odd thing is, there would have once been a time, probably no more than ten hours ago actually, when a response like that would have really annoyed her. But now, looking up at him, Claire couldn't think of one single thing she would change about Owen Grady. Not one. And she could tell by the way her sister grinned eagerly at the two holding hands that she wanted to know all about the new man with them.

"Just that you're Claire's boyfriend." Claire could feel herself going pink as she noticed Owen turn to her in surprise, but she did not look back at him, instead raising her eyebrows at Karen. The older sister rolled her eyes, turning to her son's and swatting them both playfully on the arm: "Oh boys, you made that up?!" The boys held their hands up, looking now in disbelief at their aunt who still held hands with the man who had worked with her to get them out of a lot of trouble overnight. "She said he was her boyfriend!" said Zach defensively.

"No that's not entirely true..." Claire quickly replied, holding her free hand up to stop her nephews from saying any more as they were swatted once again by their mother. She noticed Owen had started grinning at her embarrassment, still with a hint of surprise in his expression. "…I just didn't object when you called him my boyfriend!" No sooner had she finished her sentence her sister rolled her eyes again, and turned from the boys to Claire with her eyebrows raised "Oh well that's the same thing! Sorry boys."

"It's…" Claire stopped arguing as she felt Owen squeeze her hand again and she turned to him as he smiled at her, shaking his head slightly as if to tell her not to worry about it anymore. She turned back to her sister who now held a key up to Claire's face, "Room key. You look like you haven't slept in days." Claire took it gratefully, inspecting the name of the hotel on the oversized keyring that the key was attached too. Her sister continued to talk, though the thought of finally being able to lay down was slowly drowning out Karen's voice: "Go get a shower and get some rest. We're in the room next door so we can meet you for dinner or something later. Deal?" Claire just nodded before feeling Owen tug at her hand, pulling her in the direction of what she presumed was the hotel.

Claire felt terrible. Normally once something was in her diary she stuck to it. But the meeting between Mr Misrani , Letitia and six potential investors was going on far longer than she had anticipated that she was already forty minutes late to meet Owen as it was. The man did not have a cell, nor did he have any internet, so without going over to the docks herself she had no way of telling her date that she was running late. It was her fault that the meeting had been arranged so quickly, having suddenly had an idea of a petting and riding zone in the centre of the park to increase interest by families who had younger children. This idea had captured the attention of six investors, which hadn't happened since the launch of the T-Rex before the park opened. Mr Misrani had been so impressed with Claire's initiative, and the speed in which she came up with a business plan, that he insisted on holding the meeting almost instantly late that afternoon to keep the investors interest. So Claire perched on the edge of her seat, listening to the questions the investors still had, hoping that they would soon run out.

She had only been in the position of Park Operations and Assets Manager for a couple of months and was finally beginning to understand the routine expected of her. Letitia, the Senior Park Operations and Assets Manager, was kind in her own way, having taken to calling Claire "kid" even though the young woman was thirty. Letitia was sharp, firm and strict when surrounded by their staff below them, even when in meetings with potential investors and fellow managers. But when it came to the two of them being alone together the older woman would give Claire pointers on how to gain respect from her staff, how to ooze authority, and how to own a room, so that all would turn to her if they needed something and all would bow to her if she needed something. And, naturally, Claire drank in every word she spoke, trying to absorb the advice and put it into practice while walking around the park. After all, Letitia had been the Senior Park Operations and Assets Manager for Jurassic World since the park had opened seven years ago. In fact since before then, because she had overseen the asset development and pens used to keep the assets while the park was being built. Nobody knew how to run the park better than she did. She had seen it all. And it was Claire's hope to one day replace her in the senior position when Letitia retired. Plenty of time to learn everything there was to know about the role without having too much responsibility than she could handle.

By the time the meeting had finished it was almost nine thirty. On a plus side the park now had six new investors willing to pay big money for an exciting new venture and Simon Misrani was over the moon. The down side was that, as Claire walked out of the board room, she was certain there was no way her date would still be at the docks. And if he was then there was a high chance that if she went down there now he would be fairly drunk. So, regretfully, she decided to have her driver take her to her condo on the western side of the island.

The car pulled up to the front of the land her home lay on, and she tipped her driver before stepping out of the vehicle. As it drove away she closed her eyes and took a deep breath. The condo was one of the perks of her new position, along with the large pay packet, promise of promotion, and the huge challenge of her role (which Claire thrived on). It was part of a collection of condos that were clustered together like a sort of village, where all the managers and senior members of staff lived. The condos were huge, decorated with all the modern technology that had been about in 2004 when they had been built, and each condo boasted a large stretch of land surrounding each one, so Claire was able to return to her own little place of tranquillity at the end of a long day.

She began walking up the path towards the front door, the porch light having turned on automatically when the daylight gave way to dusk, a mod-con of the condos. Her favourite thing to do already was to sit on the porch with a large glass of wine, looking up at the stars, light pollution having not found her section of the island. It was something she planned to do again tonight.

She unlocked the front door of her condo, stepping over the threshold and closing the door behind her. She'd spent enough of her life alone that it was never unusual to step into an empty house and hear no noise other than the sound of her heels echoing back at her when she stepped through the door and onto the wooden flooring. Placing her handbag on the floor, Claire reached to her right and switched on the light of the lounge area. She paused, looking around the room that was dressed with a couple of sofas, a nice flat-screen television that she never watched, empty bookshelves, a clean coffee table with a couple of the park's brochure's on the surface, and a fireplace that she would never have a reason to light. The atmosphere in the air was always too stuffy here on Isla Nublar.

Despite the objects in the room, the condo felt empty. Claire's heart fell as she walked straight through to the kitchen, listening to the sound of her heels echoing back at her. She reached into the large fridge that was mostly empty except for several bottles of wine that she had stocked up on when she had first moved in, a couple of bottles of milk, and some fresh fruit she had delivered every other day, which her housekeeper signed for. Claire pulled out a bottle of wine, grabbed a glass from the cupboard beside the fridge, and began pouring the wine into the glass as she paced back over to the front door.

Claire sat back in the rocking chair that stood in the corner of the porch and she looked up at the stars, with the tears that had been welling up from inside her finally falling down her cheeks as she silently cried. Most nights she mulled over how she had lived her life up 'til now. What would be different if she had been braver, or more confident, or if she had been on more dates. She may have managed to find the one by now. She may be coming home to a gaggle of her own children, dressed in their PJ's, who would've leapt on her the moment she stepped foot over the threshold, telling her how much they had missed her. And she would hold them so, so tight, kiss her husband hello, and they would take their children upstairs and tuck them into bed, reading them bedtime stories before kissing them goodnight. Claire continued swigging her wine thoughtfully. She had always been so unlucky in love. It was inevitable that tonight would have been a disaster if she had met up with her date tonight.

She had no way of contacting Owen. She had no idea where he lived, she had no idea what his position was at the park, she had no idea what his last name even was. All she knew was that his name was Owen, and that from their very brief yet memorable interaction earlier that day he seemed like a cheeky young man.

She closed her eyes, remembering his lopped smile as he'd looked at her. She remembered how her heart had been hammering against her chest as she'd felt the intensity of his stare. She had, of course, noticed him from across the room before he had bumped into her. How could she not have? He had been the only person in the whole room, possibly the whole building, who had chosen to wear cargo pants and a white t-shirt. One that had shown off his muscular tanned arms. Claire remembered noting that he was probably the only other person in the room who was likely to be around her age. And the idea that he may have been as driven and ambitious as her had excited her.

She had always been the one to watch from afar. She was always jealous of the women who could go up to any guy anywhere and strike up a conversation or simply give him her number. She never approached guys. And guys never approached her. But for some reason, whether it was because of her new job, her new life, her new hope , she had offered to get the coffees for Letitia, Simon, and their potential investor. She of course could have never expected Owen to turn into her, spilling hot coffee down her new white dress. She had been so angry that he had been so reckless, anger that was intensified by his laughter. It hadn't been funny. She could have been hurt. And worse, she had got huge coffee stains down her front. It was the only time she had needed to use the change of clothes that she always kept in her office, and she hoped it would be the last time.

While she wasn't one for forgiving someone quickly, she could tell it had been a big deal for him to approach her and apologise. People didn't often apologise to her. Her sister had once said that it was because Claire's attitude stank - she was always adamant that she was right, even if she was wrong. She had enjoyed hearing Owen apologise though. And she had enjoyed looking into his eyes even more. She was often seen as a difficult character to get to know, mostly because she was very cautious with the information she shared with others. She was sharp, and could easily snap, her mother once claiming that her attitude was down to her flaming red hair. But the man before her didn't seem overly bothered, as though he were used to dealing with people with a challenging character.

It didn't matter though, not now that she had missed their date. So with a heavy sigh she took another big gulp of her wine, and continued looking up at the starry night sky, coming to terms with the likelihood that she may never see this Owen man again.


	3. Crisp White Sheets & Battered Feet

Owen mustered what little energy he had left to keep his eyes from closing as he watched Claire fumble the hotel key into the door of the room her sister had got for them. Well it had been a room her sister had got for Claire, but he'd found himself walking with the red head anyway, and now stood with his hand in hers, their fingers tangled together. She hadn't objected, just like he hadn't objected when her nephews and sister had brought up the subject of him being her boyfriend. He hadn't got the energy to think about anything other than collapsing in a heap and finally falling asleep.

As he heard Claire finally unlock the door he let out a long sigh, his body having gone mostly numb as a result of the wide mix of stress and emotion it had been through over the previous twenty hours or so. Daylight seeped through the large windows of the cool, clean hotel room. Owen hadn't been in anything so expensive looking since his interview for the position of raptor trainer. He began walking slowly into the suite, hearing the door close behind him. He knew Claire was still beside him, having walked with him, as he still held onto her hand and she onto his. Both adults still had no idea what to do. Right now it was a toss-up between each having a shower or simply collapsing onto the bed and falling asleep.

Owen looked down to his right to see that Claire was already looking up at him. He thought she had looked exhausted earlier but now that they were finally somewhere they could rest she looked even more exhausted. He somehow mustered the energy to give her a grin, squeezing her hand as he did so. He really didn't know what more he could do. He noticed she was nodding slightly, her small smile mirroring his, though he wasn't sure why. He watched as she turned back to the room, noticing the large bed towards the back of the room and he heard her groan slightly:

"Why are the sheets so white?" he let out a quiet laugh as Claire complained rhetorically with a tired tint to her voice. "I can't fall asleep on that in this state." He watched her walk towards the back of the room, shrugging off the blanket that had been around her shoulders and lightly glazing her fingertips along the surface of the crisp white bedsheets longingly. It wasn't until he was watching her do this that he realised she had let go of his hand, and it wasn't until this that he realised he missed the feel of her hand.

"Go have a shower. A hot shower. As hot as you can cope with." He began walking towards her as he spoke, she on the other hand had frozen, watching him from over her shoulder as she faced the open door of the bathroom beside the bed. "Take as long as you need then I'll go in after you." He continued.

"You smell worse than I do though." Owen couldn't help but laugh at her response, loving that she hadn't lost her sharp sense of humour, and he watched as her smile grew across her face. Her eyes, though tired, seemed to sparkle at the sound of his laughter.

"I know. Which is why you won't want to use the shower after me. Am I right?" He watched Claire give a small nod, and he noticed that her smile had faded. He watched her turn to the door of the bathroom and make her way through to the toilet, sitting on the closed seat. She hadn't even closed the door, which gave Owen the impression that her exhaustion was far greater than he'd first thought.

He approached the door and watched as the woman before him slipped her left heel from her foot with a wince. He hadn't seen blisters and cuts like that in a long time, not since his navy training days, and he knew how much they hurt. What hurt him the most at that moment though was the look on her face. The look of pain, exhaustion, concern. Owen thought that if anyone had turned to him when he'd woken the previous morning and told him that not only would he have almost been eaten alive by rampaging dinosaurs but that he would have gone through the whole experience with the head-strong, stubborn, organised Claire Dearing by his side, he would have laughed in their face. Loudly. And then laughed even louder if they continued to tell him that she would have saved his life. More than once. And he would have had to send them away if they finished what they were telling him by informing him that not only had he kissed her in a spur of the moment on the island, but that he would end up being unable to entertain the idea of leaving her once they had left the island together.

But that was how he felt now. He watched her look up at him, and when he saw her try to give him a reassuring smile he knew that there was definitely no way he would be leaving her. Owen began to walk over to her, and he felt a sharp pain running up his right leg that he hadn't noticed before. He had noticed it aching, but it hadn't been a pain like this. He had barely reached out his hand before she clung to it, and they worked together to help her stand. He noticed her wince as he brought a hand to her back and he wondered if she had as many cuts and bruises on her back as she did have on her arms and legs. He sharply brought his hand away, stepping over the discarded heels.

"Didn't I tell you those heels would be a bad idea?" He hoped that she would laugh at his joke, but instead she sighed, tired and weak. He wasn't offended, he understood how she felt, and walked with her towards the shower cubicle, trying to support her weight as much as she allowed him to. Owen reached into the shower, turning it on and holding out his hand to feel the temperature of the water. He looked up at the shower head, impressed by the strong pressure of the water. He knew this was going to be the best shower he had ever had, but the water pressure wasn't going to make it even better. He hoped that after a long hot shower and some good sleep Claire would begin to look and feel better. He looked down to his right to see her looking up at him. He couldn't read her expression because she looked so tired.

"That should be the right temperature." He found himself saying, "I'll give you some privacy." She looked as though she needed a good cry, and could understand that the shower would be the best place for her to be if she did. He knew she was a private person. That she didn't often let her guard down, and that he may be the only person in her whole life who had ever seen her looking so vulnerable. So as she shot him a grateful smile, he turned and limped out of the bathroom, closing the door behind him.

Owen went to sit on the edge of the bed but stopped himself, having realised just how smelly he was. He would never forgive himself if he messed up the white sheets that Claire had so longingly looked at. So instead he walked over to the nearby chair, perching on its firm seat and trying to ease his own boots off. Miraculously his feet were in fairly good condition and he was grateful that he had put on his worn-in boots for work the previous morning. His feet were nowhere near as bloodied and battered as Claire's were.

He rose his head, listening out for any signs of any tears, but there were none. All that sounded was the noise of the shower water running over Claire's body, and he wondered if she were just stood under the shower head, much like he intended on doing.


	4. Dark Dirt & Old Blood

"You smell worse than I do though." Claire could feel a smile grow automatically on her face as she heard Owen let out a small laugh at her words. All that they had been through and somehow they still had an ounce of energy left to laugh. Though it didn't take long for the smile to fade again, as a new wave of exhaustion fell over her body.

"I know. Which is why you won't want to use the shower after me. Am I right?" Claire gave a small nod and made her way over to the bathroom, beginning to wince silently as she did so. She wasn't sure if it was because she was finally at the hotel or that she was so close to finally being able to go to sleep, but Claire's feet were really starting to ache. She heard her heels clop on the floor of the bathroom as she entered it and made her way over to the closed lid of the toilet seat. Sitting down on it felt like a little piece of heaven and with a deep breath she brought her left foot up and undid the straps of her dependable heel. It looked as though it could fall apart with nothing more than a gentle breeze, but Claire still peeled it from around her bare foot.

The skin around her toes and heel looked ghastly. Battered, bruised and bleeding as though she had built many blisters from running in the forest in them, and that all those blisters had burst, and made new blisters, and burst again. Now that Claire could see the damage her feet really did hurt, and it took all of her energy to peel her heel from around her right foot too. She was certain that foot looked worse. Probably because she was right handed or something. She wanted to cry as she placed her feet on the cool floor of the tiled bathroom, but she had no more energy left.

Claire looked up at the bathroom door and realised that it hadn't swung shut like the front door had. In the doorway stood Owen, tired, bedraggled, and with a concerned expression on his face. Claire began to muster a smile to give him, and to tell him she was okay, but she didn't feel okay. Instead she watched him ease his way across the bathroom towards her with a slight limp, his own feet having evidently taken a battering, and he helped her stand up. She felt a sharp pain on her back as he brought a hand there to help push her up, and she winced causing him to quickly pull his hand away as though it had burnt him. "Didn't I tell you those heels would be a bad idea?" She sighed at his unhelpful comment, but not in the disapproving or frustrated way that she'd always used to, it was more of a tired sigh.

He helped her over to the shower, turning it on for her as she lent on the open door of the white cubicle. She watched as he held his rough hand out under the running water whilst looking up at the shower head. She, however, noticed the dark dirt and old blood that ran from his hand to the shower floor and swirled down the drain. Claire looked up to his face to see if he was in any pain, but if he was he wasn't revealing it. She watched him turn to her, his eyes looking down at her with a mix of concern and reassurance.

"That should be the right temperature. I'll give you some privacy." Claire gave him a grateful smile then watched as he slowly limped out of the bathroom, closing the door behind him. Normally she would lock the door to any bathroom she'd be in, but not this time. No, she chose to save her energy to wash her hair instead of walking all the way over to the door to lock it. Besides, she trusted Owen with her life. She trusted he wouldn't let anybody into their suite, and that he wouldn't walk into this room uninvited. So she gently pulled her clothes from around her weak body, wincing as the material glazed across cuts she hadn't noticed she'd had until now, and stepped into the shower.

As the hot water fell onto her skin she took a deep breath, feeling safe for the first time in a long time. She thought she would cry in relief the moment she stepped into the cubicle, but no tears were left in her body, pulling her into the conclusion that she was probably dehydrated. So she resorted to placing her two hands on the wall of the cubical, letting the shower water flow over her body, as she stared down at the filthy water running off her body and down the drain.


	5. Early Retirement & A Deal

Claire wrapped the white towel tightly around her naked body, still feeling exhausted with pain in parts, but certainly cleaner than she had been before her shower. This alone made her relax slightly. She reached out a hand, turned the door handle, and stepped gently out of the bathroom into the bedroom. Her feet felt the soft carpet for the first time, and despite plenty of attention from the hot shower water, they still boasted severe blisters which was why she was still in so much pain.

Claire saw Owen sat on a chair to her right, he had taken his boots and waistcoat off, and raised his head from hands. He looked exhausted, and rightfully so. He had ran as much as she had, he had protected her nephews when she wasn't close enough to, he had protected her when he'd needed to. And of course she had saved his skin a couple of times too. Though she wasn't going to remind him of it. He stood up slowly, wincing slightly while Claire stepped forward to offer support, but as she approached him she realised just how short she was without her heels on. There was no way she could physically support him. So instead she brought her arm back down to her side and watched him force a reassuring smile onto his face. She watched him limp past her towards the bathroom, then turn back, motioning to the bed.

"Your sister dropped off some clothes." Claire looked over to the bed and sure enough there lay a neatly folded vest top, skirt, and underwear, all that were very much her older sister's style. The "Mom style" as Claire used to tease. Next to the clothes were another set. Long pair of Quicksilver shorts that she suspected were in fact swim shorts, a white t shirt, and a pair of boxers. When Claire looked back at Owen she noticed he had moved into the bathroom, the door gently swinging closed. With a gentle sigh she heard the shower begin to run again, and the water cascade over Owen's body. She heard him wincing for a moment and wondered how many cuts and bruises he had sustained during their time they had spent running for their lives.

Claire walked across to the cabinet beside the bed, pulling open one of the draws and finding a hair dryer right away. She gently began to uncurl the cord to get ready to plug it into the wall when she heard a quiet sob. She froze, looking up at the bathroom door, and her heart fell. It hadn't occurred to her that Owen might cry. He always seemed so cocky, so strong, so macho. She immediately felt embarrassed that she had made such an assumption that he never cried. Everything they had been through since yesterday morning. The adrenaline and emotion must have got to him. She imagined that he had stayed so strong for her for so long that now he was finally alone and had time to stop he could finally cry. Claire stuffed the plug of the hair dryer into the socket and began to dry her hair. She didn't care that she didn't have a hair brush. She had no reason to be presentable. Owen had seen her looking her worst, he could deal with her looking clean if a little scruffy.

By the time she had switched the hair dryer off she had used the last of her energy. Claire picked up the vest top, pulling it over her head and covering the top half of her body. She stood up before putting the panties over her legs and pulling them up to her hips. She took one last look over at the bathroom door, listening to the sound of the shower water still going and she could no longer hear Owen sobbing. Claire took the corner of the soft white duvet and crawled into the large bed. It was cool and fresh as she wrapped the duvet around her weak body. She heard Owen turn the shower off, and smiled knowing she wouldn't need to stay awake for much longer. Claire turned on her side, wanting to face the bathroom door, wanting to face Owen so she felt safer. But she never heard him come back into the room, because no sooner had Claire turned on her side, she had closed her eyes and fallen asleep.

Owen closed the door behind himself, feeling the cool tiles on the floor beneath his bare aching feet. With a long sigh he pulled his filthy shirt over his head, slipped out of his pants and boxers, and stepped into the shower. The hot water raced over his body and it was every bit a brilliant as he had imagined it would be. Until the hot water reached the cuts on his arms. And back. And legs. He looked down at his right leg and noticed it boasted a huge cut on his calf. He couldn't be sure how it had got there. Had it been from sharp rocks? A branch? Perhaps even a dinosaur had caught their claw on him? He had been in the middle of so much danger and destruction over the past twenty hours that he could have got it from anywhere. He winced as the hot water washed away the muck and dry blood from the wound. It had miraculously begun healing well though and he wasn't concerned about it.

He brought his hands to his eyes. All of a sudden he realised that his life was never going to be the same again. He had spent almost four years training his raptors. They had become like children to him. And he had seen three of them die last night. Blue survived. But Charlie, Delta, and Echo were dead. Dead.

A loud sob left his lips as tears fell from his eyes, mixing with the shower water, and he brought a hand down to his mouth to try to contain his upset as he leant his other hand and forehead against the wall of the shower. All the stress, strain and emotion had become too much for him. He wasn't one for crying, but his body shook uncontrollably. To his relief he heard what he thought was a hair dryer in the bedroom, giving him an opportunity to sob again. Before long the tears had stopped pouring from his eyes, and he was breathing properly again. Then the hair dryer stopped. Owen reached for the shampoo and body wash, cleansing his body as thoroughly as his energy would let him, before turning the shower off.

Wrapping the other white towel in the bathroom around his waist, Owen slowly made his way to the door and opened it. Peering into the bedroom, he had expected to see Claire on the edge on the bed, waiting to interrogate him about why he might have been sobbing. But to his surprise the red head had passed out in the bed to his left, curled up under the crisp white duvet as close to the edge of the bed that he had ever seen anyone be without falling out.

He took the boxers that Claire's sister had embarrassedly handed him along with the rest of the clothes earlier. She hadn't told him where she had got them and in a way he was grateful. As he pulled the boxers up to his waist he looked over at Claire asleep in the bed and immediately felt jealous that she was already asleep. So with a yawn he relaxed a little, dropping the towel on the chair that he had been sitting on earlier, and moved around to the other side of the bed.

Pulling back his side of the duvet, Owen crawled into the bed, a wave of relief and fatigue and weakness rushing over his body instantly. He made sure to keep his body on the edge of his side of the bed, so much so that another one, possibly even to people could lay between his body and Claire's. He presumed the reason she was so far on the edge of her side of the bed was because she didn't want to run the risk of accidentally touching him in her sleep. So to avoid making her feel uncomfortable he lay far on his side of the bed, but making sure that he faced her as he slept to ensure she was safe.

Before he fell asleep he noticed a large dark cut diagonally across Claire's back. No wonder she had been in pain when he had accidentally touched it earlier. It wouldn't surprise him if she had got that cut from her dangerous chase with the T-Rex last night. He brought up a hand to glaze a finger over the cut, to assess how deep it was or if it was infected, but he stopped himself, remembering who she was. She wasn't his girlfriend like her nephews had presumed. She wasn't even his friend. Was she? They didn't really know a lot about each other. They were acquaintances really. Acquaintances who had spent the past twenty hours together fearing for their lives. Fearing for each other's lives. Acquaintances who had shared a kiss, yes, but in a fleeting moment. It hadn't been a romantic moment. It hadn't been as though she had reciprocated the kiss back. She had just stood, frozen to the spot. Owen closed his eyes, replaying the moment, cringing as he remembered the look of surprise on her face. Had she not enjoyed it? Had she not been feeling the same way? But she had given him a small nod as they had pulled apart, what did that mean? And she hadn't objected the times her nephews had called him her boyfriend apparently. So…did she want him to be her boyfriend?

Owen shuffled his feet on the ground, wiping his hands on the dirty cloth he had strapped to the belt that wrapped around his waist, whilst looking at the large pen his raptors would be living in. He had spent a long three years imprinting on them since accepting his position within the Jurassic World team. It had started out by being present when they hatched, and since then it had been his job to be around them as much as possible. It hadn't felt like a job though. He had become attached to them. Coming up with names for them himself. Echo, Delta, Charlie, and Blue. Blue was the stronger and more dominant of the four, having hatched first. But Owen was still the alpha in their little pack. He had felt it was his responsibility to be present when their new pen was being constructed, even helping to build it in parts. It was their final pen, the raptors having grown so fast that the construction team had had to keep building bigger temporary pens for them to be contained until their final pen had been built. With every new pen it was almost a step backwards for Owen, who looked smaller with every bigger pen the raptors moved into, which made them difficult to train as they realised just how dominant they could be over humans. Owen had the feeling he would no longer be able to stand with them on their level any more, which was why he had requested a bridge be built over the raptor's pen so that he could be taller than them and still be considered the alpha.

Owen glanced to his right as he saw his friend and colleague Barry swan up to him, a broad smile on his face. Owen knew that look. He hadn't seen it in a long time. It had been the look Barry had given him last year, when he had asked Claire Dearing out. Owen had felt guilty that he hadn't actually ended up meeting with her. In fact he hadn't even managed to get down to the docks like he had first arranged with the red head. No, he had been stuck on the south-west side of the island as his raptors had almost broken out of their pen. Before he knew it the time had been nine in the evening. He knew his date would have been exactly on time, she just seemed that organised. So with a shrug, and a slight twist in his stomach, he'd resorted to just getting a lift with Barry where he was dropped off at his bungalow on the east-coast of the island.

She hadn't made an effort to get in contact with him, and he knew that he had blown any chance of taking her out on a date, getting the suspicion that she would've immediately written him off. So he had made no effort to find out what her number might have been so he could call her from his office out here on the island. But he hadn't forgotten her. He could still remember the smell of her perfume, her red hair, and bright green eyes. They almost haunted him in his dreams. Not that he would admit that to Barry.

"You'll never guess who's paying us a visit later today." Barry grinned at him, and Owen looked back over at the pen, stuffing the cloth back into his belt.

"Let me guess. Corporate?" Owen replied, already getting riled up at the idea of the big-wigs sticking their noses into their business far too early.

"The raptor's two investors. And our new Senior Park Operations and Assets Manager." Barry continued, and Owen noticed his colleague's eyes on him, waiting to see his reaction. Owen furrowed his brow. What did he mean by new Senior Park Operations and Assets Manager? What had happened to Letitia? He hadn't put her down as a quitter.

As though he had read his mind, Barry answered his questions. "You really need to start checking your emails! Remember the last asset out of containment?"

"The five Dimorphodon's in The Birdcage?"

"Yeah, well turns out it was too much for Cruella. She took early retirement. Something about it being an accident waiting to happen. For a woman who spent so many years building a reputation for herself she didn't half storm out in a state." Barry said with a grin, laughing to himself as he looked up at the new pen.

"So who's running the joint now?" Owen asked, though as soon as Barry looked at him with a teasing grin he knew. Claire Dearing. "Seriously?" he said to his friend in shock, as Barry burst into laughter. "She's barely been at the park a year how the hell is she going to run the place?!"

Barry continued laughing but Owen couldn't see the funny side. There was no way Claire could handle the smooth running of the park with the same air of authority and discipline that Letitia had. Letitia never interfered in the work they did with the raptors. In fact, the last time he had seen her was the last time he had seen Claire, which had been a year ago, when they had first met. When he had asked her out. The day he'd let her down.

"They want to find out what our plans are with the raptors." Continued Barry, who could see Owen's concern. The news didn't exactly put a smile on his manager's face.

"I thought you'd told them we would get in touch with them once we knew." Said Owen, as he turned on his heel and began walking away from the new pen and over to the new smaller building beside the pen that was set to be their new office.

"I did, but Claire was very insistent they visit."

At the mention of her name Owen hesitated. Of course she had been insistent. Despite the previous Senior Park Operations and Assets Manager having never visited them she apparently often sent the raptor team emails once a week to chase them up. Demanding to know what progress had been made with the training. Demanding to know how long it would be until the raptors could actually do something that was beneficial to the park. After one very heated discussion with one of the co-ordinator's PA's Owen had been banned from communicating with the top-dogs. Barry was the one who did all the talking now.

Owen looked behind them at the van that he knew held his raptors. They were quiet for now, but they needed time to settle into their new surroundings without the bosses breathing down their necks, "When do they get here?" he asked.

"In an hour."

Owen wasn't surprised when just under an hour later he heard the sound of car tyres rolling up. He shut the doors of the van gently, having just checked on the raptors, and looked over to see the red haired woman that he had stood up stepping out of her car, turning to peer at her reflection in her car window briefly, seemingly satisfied that her hair was in a reasonable position tied in a tight bun at the back of her head. He couldn't understand why his breathing had shortened slightly. This was it, he had to apologise. Again. He hated apologising. With a deep breath he walked towards her as she walked towards him.

"Mr Grady." He heard her say, and though she looked at him professionally, there had been a slight waver in the way she had addressed him.

"Ms Dearing." He couldn't help the small smile that peeked out of the corner of his mouth, as he saw her take a deep breath. In her arms she clutched a small collection of paperwork. "Listen I'm sorry about last year…our date…" He noticed her hesitate as he spoke, as though she really hadn't expected him to speak about anything personal, let alone apologise. "…the raptors had almost got out of their pen so I had to fix it without getting my arms chewed off and couldn't make it to the docks in time so…I'm sorry."

He watched as she raised her eyebrows slightly, as though battling with something in her mind, but he couldn't tell what it was. To his relief her face relaxed, and as a result his stomach unknotted. "That's okay." She said, her voice sounding as clear and beautiful as it had done when she had initially agreed to go out with him. "Actually I…" but before she could finish her sentence another car pulled up beside hers. Within it was presumably the two raptor investors. And the conversation between the Raptor Trainer and Senior Park Coordinator and Assets Manager immediately came to an end.

Over an hour had passed. Owen and Barry had taken their visitors in and around the new large pen they planned to train the raptors in, describing how the training was going, even giving them the opportunity to see the raptors. Though the dinosaurs hadn't exactly been welcoming.

As the two raptor investors pulled away from the area, Owen walked Claire to her car, noticing that Barry had made a swift exit. An exit Owen was very grateful for. He watched as the woman brought her hand to the door of her car, her porcelain skin seemingly shining from the late afternoon sun, and pulled it open. Suddenly Owen placed his hand against the door, causing her to freeze, and he saw her eyes look to him questioningly.

"I was wondering if we could give the date another go? I know I screwed up by missing our last one, and I'm sorry about that, but I promise I'm a really fun guy to go on a date with." He watched her hesitate, as though trying to read his mind. Then a small smile grew on her face and she gave him a small nod.

"Okay. What do you propose we do?"

"Why don't we just meet where we originally planned at the original time and take it from there. I promise I won't be late this time." Owen smiled, pointing his finger at the woman before him. "And if you think of anything specific you want us to do, then you can let me know when we meet."

He saw her looking at his finger before looking up at him, smiling curiously at him. "Okay. And now I know you own a phone, you can call me if you're going to be late." He saw her motion to the new office with her head and he knew she meant his office phone. He wasn't sure how long he'd been smiling at her, but he continued to do so, excited about getting a second chance for a date with a woman that seemed far challenging then any woman he'd date before.

"It's a deal. See you tonight at 7." He noticed a flicker of panic run across her face, but he gave her time to hesitate, her mind clearly thinking through her plan for the day, and when she decided 7 wouldn't be an inconvenience she stuck her hand out with a confident smile. Owen took it, her hand feeling soft and cool against his rough hot hand, and they shook in agreement.

They'd had an unusual collection of interactions from the moment they had first met a few years ago. Owen opened his eyes one last time, admiring the porcelain skin belonging to the back of the woman lying on the other side of the bed to him. It was scratched and bruised, and he felt guilty that he had put her through such a traumatic day. He should have insisted more strongly that she not go with him to look for her nephews. But he knew how stubborn she was. He knew there would have been no telling her she couldn't go. She had been by his side through the whole ordeal, save for the moment she ran off to get the T-Rex. Owen couldn't help the small smile that peeped into the corners of his mouth as he remembered how impressed he'd been by her guts. Putting her life on the line just to give them a chance to get away from the I-Rex. She'd revealed parts of her personality that he'd never seen before. That beyond all that polished exterior, there was a brave and active woman, who was willing to risk her life for the people she loved. Well for her nephews who she loved, and him who she…Owen had no idea how she felt about him.  
He watched her sigh deeply in her sleep, her shoulder rising and falling. He knew that he irritated her. She irritated him too. At least she had done at first. But so much had changed since she first arrived at his bungalow late yesterday morning that he was fairly certain there was nothing she could do now that would ever annoy him again. At least that's how he felt. He just wasn't sure if or how he was ever going to be able to tell her that.

And that was the final thought Owen had before he fell into a deep sleep.


	6. Sheridan's Creek & Jack's Bar

Owen stirred, hearing the sound of a small groan, followed by a big sigh. And he heard it directly next to him, if not ever-so slightly below his chin. And following the groan and sigh he felt someone in his arms shuffle their weight slightly, their leg in between his as one of their arms wrapped around his torso, the other he could feel sandwiched between his chest and theirs. One of his arms laid out under the pillows and what felt like the person's head. The other was wrapped tightly around their waist. Owen hadn't woken up like this in a very, very long time. He opened his eyes to see that the sunlight from the window behind him was still seeping into the room, and the body curled up beside him was the very woman he'd fallen asleep looking at the back of.

He looked down at the top of her head and smiled slightly as he felt her light breath against his chest. The Claire Dearing he'd known yesterday was gone. This was the Claire Dearing he'd known was in there somewhere. The more affectionate one. The one who didn't care who saw her in anything but smart clothing, with unbrushed hair and a makeup-less face. This Claire Dearing he'd be more than happy to date, if the opportunity ever came about.

He felt her stir again, before she moved her head up to look at his face. She brought the hand that she had sandwiched between their chests up to her eyes and gave them a gentle rub before letting out a calm sigh. Her green eyes locked with his and he gave her a smile. They remained in that position, looking at each other for a little while, and Owen could hardly believe that Claire wasn't moving away from him. She had brought that free hand up and it was now wedged between his cheek and the pillow his head lay on, her thumb gently caressing his cheek. She had brought her face a little closer to his, but they remained still, enjoying the feeling of safety in each other's arms. This was how he'd hoped he would wake up a couple of years ago after their first date. Unfortunately it hadn't gone as well as he'd hoped.

"Well now I feel dressed up." Owen looked down at his board shorts, then back up at the red head, who had just arrived at the docks, her voice oozing a hint of aggravation. She was dead on time. Just as they had arranged. He had made an effort to be early, knowing full well that she would be on time, and she hadn't disappointed. In fact, she was far from disappointing. She was dressed in a figure hugging dark green dress, and her red hair was down, long and flowing past her shoulders, with one side of her hair held back with a green and silver clip. Owen did everything he could to keep breathing, his heart having felt as though it had stopped the moment he set his eyes on her.

"We're meeting on the docks for dinner, in the middle of summer, off the coast of South America. What did you expect me to wear?" Owen asked, confused about why she had a problem with his choice in clothing. In his defence these were the only clothes he owned that didn't have rips, tears, or bite-marks in.

"Something a little more…I don't know…datey?" Owen furrowed his brow slightly at her suggestion. Any woman he had been on a date with before, he had charmed so much that they were practically ready to rip his clothes off his body before they even had a chance to process what he was wearing. One woman actually had!

"Well I can leave if you want?" He suggested, not really wanting to, and to his delight he saw the red head bring a hand to his arm to stop him turning away from her. Her skin felt as cool as it had been when he had shaken it earlier that day.

"No." She said quickly, before retracting her hand, embarrassed that her immediate reaction had been that, "Erm…I mean…maybe it's my fault for not owning clothes a little more casual than this." Owen watched her point down at her dress, and he desperately wanted to tell her that there was no way he wished she was wearing anything else. He could see her cheeks flushing a bit in embarrassment and he motioned to the door of the bar they stood outside of.

"Let's get a drink." He said, and she stepped towards the bar he had indicated to, clutching a small bag that he hadn't noticed before, but he soon moved his eyes down to her body as he followed her.

As Claire stepped into the bar, Owen noticed that all of the people inside turned to look at them. It was one of the many bars along this section of the docks that were aimed at adults: couples, friends, siblings. All bars and restaurants. Within this bar though there were mostly men. All of whom were immediately drawn to Claire, who had wrinkled her nose at the smell of the building, clearly over-dressed for this type of bar. Owen, however, was loving that he was with her, and nodded at a couple of men who had given him a thumbs up.

He quickly found them a small booth, half hoping that Claire would sit beside him, but it didn't surprise him when she chose to sit opposite, placing her clutch on the small table between them. He knocked knees with her and apologised, and she continued to look unimpressed. He gave her a smile and she forced a small grin, pursing her lips as she did so. He could tell she wasn't enjoying this experience already. Fortunately the waitress was quick to approach their booth. Claire ordered a gin and tonic, Owen ordered a beer.

"So, you hate this place. I can tell." Owen said honestly to the red head, and Claire raised her eyebrows, nodding. "Well, this can't be the only place to go on the island." He continued.

"Actually, it's not." Claire began, and to his surprise she reached into the small bag and pulled out a small plastic envelope, delving into it and pulling out a few pieces of laminated paper. "There's Bill's down the road, I hear they do great seafood. There's the Twinkle Tent, which isn't actually a tent, I checked…" Owen looked at the woman in shock as she worked her way through the plastic papers in her hands, sliding each page across the table to him as she read out their locations. He picked them up one by one until she came to the end, and looked at him in anticipation to see if he was excited about the sound of the bars and restaurants she had found. But instead he looked from the plastic menus in his hands and back up to her, still in shock, "Are these laminated?" he asked in surprise, to which she shrugged.

"Yeah. Don't they look great?" Owen couldn't quite understand how she could find time to do all of this work what with her recent promotion that surely meant she had more things on her daily agenda. "We got a new laminator in the office and I thought, if I found a few places for us to go, I could put together menus and maps and laminate them." Sure enough Owen turned the pages over and saw there were maps on the back. All were of the same map of the docks, except for a red dot which was in a different location each page, and had a number on. Presumably the number related to a diagram of some sort, but Owen couldn't see it on the sheets. He looked back up at the woman opposite him who had picked out one final sheet of laminated paper and turned it around, holding it up in front of her so he could see what was on it.

"I thought we could go to Sheridan's Creek first, that's number one on the map…" and Owen followed her finger which went from the bar's title beside a number one on the sheet she held, over to the menu that had a number one on its map. "…grab a drink there before going over to Jack's, the Hawaiian-style bar next door, at about 8.30..." Owen watched Claire point at the title beside the number two on her page then point over to a menu in front of him that had the number two on its map. "…Then Bill's for 9.00. I took the liberty of booking us a table…" Claire motioned to her sheet again, then over to another menu in front of him with the number three on its map. "…If we finish there by 10.30 we'll have time to go to the Twinkle Tent which is this really nice bar I've heard so much about which is lit up inside by fairy lights and candles, and has a glass roof so we can look up at the stars." As she spoke Owen wasn't quite processing what she was saying. He was still pretty overwhelmed by the lamination that was happening in front of him. If he didn't think she could get any more organised, Claire placed the itinerary on the table between them, delved into her small bag, and pulled out a leaflet. Owen looked at her, still with an expression of shock that she seemed to have not noticed. "And I also had a spare few minutes earlier, so I picked this Ferry Timetable up from the reception desk. I've circled all the possible ferry's you can catch tonight when you go home." And sure enough, she slid the open leaflet over to him, and he could see the departure times neatly circled with a red pen, and the arrival times neatly circled in green. Midnight. 1am. 2am. Owen didn't even realise there was a ferry that ran that late!

He looked up at her, his mouth open slightly, not sure whether he should be impressed or remain shocked. In fact, if he hadn't been caught so off guard he probably would've laughed in her face. She was now looking at him, an excitable grin on her face. At least she was impressed with all the work she'd put into the evening's events he supposed. "So, what do you think?" she asked eagerly.

"I er…" but before Owen could answer the waitress arrived with their drinks. Owen grabbed his beer as quick as he could, chugging down several gulps until 2/3rds had gone. The waitress looked rather uncomfortable as she looked from him, to the maps on the table, over to Claire, then back to Owen, "Can I…get you something to eat or…?"

Owen picked up one of the maps, not bothering to read the number, and waved it at the waitress while shaking his head. He hadn't noticed the look of horror on Claire's face. "Nah, we're good. We're off to…" he looked over at the itinerary, read the first venue, then turned back to the waitress, "…Sheridan's Creek. We're off to Sheridan's Creek in a minute." It was enough to send the waitress away, who gave Claire a sympathetic look as if to suggest she could do better than her apparent alcoholic date, before leaving. Owen brought a hand to his forehead for a moment, trying to massage his thought process before looking back at Claire. The look on her face made him feel guilty about his reaction and he calmed down, relaxing his face into a smile.

"You know what? This is great." He said, watching as Claire relaxed her shoulders slightly, a relieved smile washing over her face as she sighed.

"Oh good. Because I'd cancelled a meeting this afternoon to have the time to sort these out." She said, and Owen began gathering together her laminated papers.

"Do you make these for all your first dates?" Owen asked with a grin as Claire drank from the straw in her small gin and tonic. He noticed her hesitate with an embarrassed smile, as she continued drinking, and drinking, until she had almost finished. Something told him she was feeling nervous. That alcohol may be the only way she would be able to deal with tonight. She looked down at her drink, swirling the ice in the glass by her straw that was between her fingertips.

"I haven't really been on many first dates." He saw her glance up at him nervously before immediately looking back down at her glass.

"What do you mean many? Like…ten? Twelve?"

"More like three. I've only ever been on three first dates. This is my third."

Owen's jaw dropped. She had to be lying. There was no way a woman of her age had only ever been on three dates in her lifetime. But then, why would she lie about something like that. It was obvious that he had been on far more, so it wasn't as though she was saying it to do him a favour.

"What so, what kind of statistics are we talking about here? Two dates in high school? Two dates in college? One in high school and one in college?" Owen still couldn't get his head around the fact that this beautiful woman in front of him had only ever been on two dates before today.

She shrugged, finishing the last of her gin and tonic before letting out a sigh, "I wasn't very popular in high school. My sister was but I wasn't. All because of my hair. Some kid started a rumour that my hair was this colour because I had a disease." Claire pulled a bit of her long red hair then released it and it bounced up into a natural loose wave. Owen wanted to laugh, he would've been one of those kids who had started a rumour like that, but he didn't laugh because her green eyes had become glassy, as though she were about to cry. " So I never got a date in high school. Not even for prom. Not even in senior year." Owen watched as Claire tried to suck more alcohol out of her glass, the remnants of some of the melted ice, before continuing with another sigh, "Then as a fresher in college some guy asked me out on a date. I thought 'this is it, finally a date', then I found out he'd only gone out with me as a part of an initiation into a frat club. He apparently had to sleep with a ginger." Owen had a knot in his stomach. That guy sounded a lot like how he had been like when he was college age. Except he never went to college, he went straight into the army. "I went through the whole of college without one ounce of interest from other guys. Then one day, in my final semester, I met a guy who worked in a coffee shop. He asked me out. And I guess you could say he became my boyfriend for a couple of months." The woman paused to take a couple of deep breaths to bring herself back to reality and fight the tears, "But then we broke up. I put too much time into my college work trying to get the best grades. So it's my fault really. I graduated top of my class, but alone. Naturally. After graduation I got a graduate job at one of Mr Misrani's offices in New York. Shot through the ranks. Then he offered me the job of Park Coordinator and Assets Manager which I accepted. And here I am."

"Wow." Owen said, trying to take on board all of the new information that had been shared with him. He knew the only way to get a sad woman into a better mood was to lighten the tone by joking with her. So that was what he was going to do, "Well…that's the most depressing story I think I've ever heard." He took a final gulp of his beer, not noticing that Claire's face had fallen further, having taken his response with offense, even with his optimistic tone. He needed to get her to another bar, where they did tequila, and Sheridan's was perfect for that, "Come on," he said, placing his glass down triumphantly, "We'd better be going."

He stood up, stretched his legs quickly, enjoying the buzz his beer was beginning to give him as he watched Claire grab her bag, stand up, and look at him curiously. "Or we're not going to make it to Sheridan's Creek in time. Which means we won't make it to Jack's in time. Which means we won't-" But before he could finish what he was saying Claire cut him off, placing a pointing finger briefly on his chest, her eyes glaring at him slightly while she spoke to him in a low stern voice.

"Don't make fun of me!"

Owen held his hands up in defence, motioning to her bag, "Hey, you're the one with the timings. I'm just following the rules." His grin hadn't helped, he knew it hadn't, and he watched as the red head paced out of the bar. As he began following Claire he saw a few of the members of the bar throw him more thumbs up, to which he reciprocated, before running after her.

All of that seemed like such a long time ago. It had been. Two years was a long time. Now they remained in their hotel suite. In bed. Together. Both perfectly happy to look into each other's eyes and feel the comfort of their bodies wrapped together after what had been such an eventful and traumatic twenty hours in the park. Owen gently moved his face half an inch closer to Claire's, so that their noses lightly touched, and he slowly rubbed his nose against hers causing a relaxed smile to creep across her face. She closed the rest of the space and this time it was Owen's turn to be surprised by a kiss, just like he had surprised her with a kiss the previous day. This time though it was gentle, it felt more meaningful, and it lasted much longer. His mind raced as he got lost in the touch of her lips, bringing his hand from around her waist and up to her hair, curling some behind her right ear.

As soon as it had happened it was over, and Claire pulled away, holding a hand to her lips as she let out a small giggle. He giggled with her, both relieved to be feeling so relaxed, relieved to be together, and both still feeling exhausted. He looked at her, shooting her a grin: "So…what do we do now?" and to his delight Claire let out a laugh at the reference he made to her question she had asked him back at the hanger. A real laugh. He had never heard her laugh before, and it was the best sound he had ever heard. It seemed so long ago that they had been in that hanger.


	7. A Small Yelp & The Perfect Puzzle Piece

Claire closed her eyes again. Kissing him was something like a dream. Her mind went fuzzy as she felt his lips crashing onto hers and hers onto his, more forcefully than when she had first kissed him just moments ago. Her lips felt as though they melted into his. Her tongue felt as though it melted into his. Her body felt as though it melted into his. All her senses pulled her towards him and him towards her until they suddenly became one. Breathing became second priority to kissing, and right now Claire gasped for air only when she really needed to. Only if his mouth trailed down to her neck. But his mouth didn't give her much time to recuperate before it returned to hers and their kissing continued. She had never, ever felt as whole and content as she did now. With this man. With Owen Grady of all men.

Well, the date was going terribly. Claire grimaced as Owen ordered his fourth shot of tequila. His first shot had been part of a pair ordered as soon as they had entered the doors of Sheridan's Shack. One of which was supposed to be hers, which she had refused to accept. So he had drank hers too. She had attempted to order another Gin and Tonic, but Sheridan's was all out of gin. So she ordered a large glass of wine, hoping it would affect her memory enough that she would put out of her mind how much of a dick Owen had been at their first bar. Owen had ordered a beer and another shot of tequila, clearly battling with the date as much as she was. Now they were sat in Jack's Hawaiian Bar, after Owen had complained loudly that Sheridan's had ran out of tequila.

Claire watched as a waitress came to their table, placing a Gin and Tonic in front of her and another shot of tequila and a beer in front of Owen. Claire watched him guzzle it down and couldn't help feeling a little sick at the thought of how much he had already consumed. Was she really that bad that he needed to drink so heavily to get through this evening?

"Well the good news is…" he started, looking at the wall behind her. Claire looked over her shoulder to see he was looking at a clock "…we are on time. No, early according to your itinerary!"

Claire rolled her eyes. Why had she even bothered with the stupid itinerary? Actually no, it had been a great idea of hers. If she hadn't made those suggestions they would've still been stuck in that dingy smelly old-man's bar down the street. Instead they were here, in the light Hawaiian bar, looking out at the ocean. This was the most beautiful location she had ever had a date at, and the best thing about it was it was her idea. So she knew she couldn't be disappointed. But why did she feel disappointed? She looked over at Owen who looked out at the ocean, his beer glass in hand. Why wasn't he asking her questions about herself? That was what people did on dates right? They asked each other questions to find out if they had anything in common. How would she know? She'd already established she had only ever been on two dates before tonight. But if the books she'd read as a child and teen had told her anything it was that questions should be asked on dates.

"So…do you have any siblings?" she asked out of the blue. She watched Owen turn to her with a smile.

"Yeah," he replied, "Two brothers. Well…one brother now. My big brother died when I was eight. Drowned in a pool." Claire's heart lurched as the once cocky man in front of her went silent, drinking several gulps of his beer before placing the glass back down, "But it's all good. My other brother is still in the Navy. Mom's pretty proud of us." Claire took a large sip of her G&T, not entirely sure how to respond. The most obvious of responses would be to say how much she understood how he felt. Her big brother had also died when she was a kid, eleven to be precise. With her Dad. In a car crash. The car had been driven off the road and into a lake. Her Dad had died upon impact, her brother several weeks later from pneumonia. He had been thirteen. And even though she wanted to tell Owen, she didn't trust him not to laugh at her. After all, he had laughed at her already tonight when she had revealed some personal things to him, what would make this personal anecdote any different? So she held her tongue.

"What about you?" she heard him ask, but she shrugged, taking a gulp of G&T, "My sister is five years older than me. We don't talk much. Only when we have to." She watched Owen nod, as though he understood what she was talking about. Technically she wasn't lying to him, which was good enough for her.

"So, are you enjoying your work?" Claire asked, desperate to get onto a conversation that they both might benefit from. For the first time all evening, she saw Owen's eyes light up and sparkle when he spoke.

"You mean the best job in the world? Yes." Owen said, grinning from ear to ear. She could tell just how passionate he was about his role, and for once she finally felt as though they may have something in common. "My raptors they're…like family you know? Like my kids."

Claire furrowed her brow. He hadn't mentioned in their walk-about with the investors earlier, about how close he had become to the raptors. It was dangerous territory. "Well, just remember to keep your distance." She said with a straight tone, just like Letitia had taught her, not long before she had ditched the park, leaving Claire in charge of running Jurassic World far sooner than she had ever felt ready to. She had been shoved in the deep end, and she had felt so overwhelmed by the intense responsibilities her immediate promotion contained. Though she never revealed it to her boss, Simon Misrani , who would often call her from New York to check that she was handling the park okay. She looked from her glass up to the man sat in front of her.

"How do you mean?" she saw Owen's face begin to fall and Claire started to shuffle uncomfortably in her seat, sipping her G&T before responding.

"I mean, they're animals. They're the park's assets. They're bred purposefully to make money for the park. By you getting attached to them, you could make some poor decisions."

"You mean decisions that are best for them instead of the park?" Claire could tell by his tone that she had aggravated him with what she had said. But she didn't care. She had to stand up for the park. It was, after all, her job to ensure that the assets where her main priority and that the park ran smoothly. If trainers were about to start becoming protective of their animals it would mean The Board, and managers like herself would struggle to ensure the best of the park was provided to the public, because trainers would start insisting things such as certain diets, environments, routines for their animals that meant less time for the public to see them. Sure they would know what was best for their animals but Claire knew what was best for the park.

"Look, the only reason why you're here in the first place is because of them. And the only reason why they are here is because of the park. So I really think you should take my advice and not get too attached to them!" Claire didn't mean to raise her voice, but she was getting frustrated, not only by his response but also by the look on his face. He was getting defensive, she could tell, but so was she. This was the angriest she had felt in several years.

"Not get too attached? Claire I imprinted on them the moment they hatched! They know nobody better than they know me. And I don't know anybody on this island better than I know them. How can I not get too attached when I already am?" Claire looked at Owen as he furiously downed the rest of his beer. She reciprocated by taking a large gulp of her G&T. How was it that he couldn't see that the time he spent with the raptors training them was his job? Had he never heard of the phrase 'never mix work with pleasure'? She watched as he set down his empty glass, getting ready for him to continue his attack. His voice remained strong and angry, but his words weren't what she expected. "Now, are we going to Bill's or not?"

Claire glanced at the clock and to her surprise it now read 8.45. Time enough to get over to the restaurant. She was almost certain she didn't want to go to another place with him, but her stomach rumbled and so she reluctantly nodded, standing up from her chair, refusing to smile because he had been the one to keep to the itinerary.

"Oww!" winced Claire and she flinched away from Owen's hand on her back, jerking closer to his body. He looked at her in concern, immediately snapping back into felt as though a razor blade was stabbing into the part of her skin that he had placed his hand on. She opened her eyes looking over at Owen and saw for the first time that he looked terrified. After everything they had been through over the course of the past day or so, this was what he looked terrified about? He was slowly beginning to move his body away from her when, with a small yelp, he fell backwards off the side of the bed, dragging the bed sheets off with him, and landed with a loud thud.

Claire immediately forgot the pain, and pulled her body quickly to the edge of the bed, tucking her legs and leaning on her left hip and hand as she looked down the side at him in concern. "Owen, are you okay?" To her relief she saw the man on the floor in front of her break into a big smile, laughing at the ridiculousness of what had just happened. It was this that made Claire laugh loudly again for the second time. She hadn't laughed this much in a very, very long time. She had once thought that she might never laugh again.

As their laughing subsided, Claire watched Owen bring a hand up to his face and rub one of his eyes before looking up at her. His hazel eyes gazed at her green, and she couldn't help the relaxed smile that still bore onto her face.  
Who would've thought that that goofy grin of his would make her feel so content? She flinched very briefly, as the wound on her back screamed again, and even though she continued to smile it was enough for Owen to get himself up off the floor and sit on the edge of the bed beside her, the tops of her legs running the length of the side of his left thigh, the tops of her feet fitting like the perfect puzzle piece around his hip, her toes against the left side of his lower back. They would hurt but right now her concentration was more on the pain the cut on her back was causing her. She had seen it of course, having peered at it in the mirror when she'd tried to try her back with the white towel in the bathroom.

She looked at the man beside her, who looked at her in concern. He didn't say anything though. He didn't do anything. He just sat there, the bed sheets scooped and gathered in a clump on his lap, his bare upper body boasting bruises, grazes, and a few deep cuts. Claire felt certain she must have roughly tore her fingers across those injuries when they had been kissing, but he hadn't once flinched, and she wondered if he was actually in any pain at all.

She slowly brought her right hand up to one of the cuts on the left side of his rib cage. The moment her cool fingertips touched the warm surface of the cut he winced and she immediately raised her hand an inch above it as though it burnt her, looking up at his face apologetically, but Owen grinned "Just kidding." He said, and Claire rolled her eyes with a small grin. Of course he was kidding. That was Owen's style.

"You're not in any pain at all?" she asked in disbelief. All the plants that they had ran through, the amount of times they had had to chuck their bodies to the ground to prevent themselves from being attacked by a dinosaur. At one point Owen actually had been attacked by a dinosaur, right before she had shot it. Right before he had kissed her. She could remember how shocked she had felt when he had tugged her towards him, his lips crashing onto hers briefly. It was like a jolt of electricity had struck her and rattled through from her head to her toes. And the moment he had pulled away to look at her, he gave her a look that no man had ever given her before. It was as though the kiss was more than a thank you. Looking back he had been so close to death Claire wondered if he had done it for fear that they may be attacked again. As though he may never get an opportunity to kiss her again. And when she had returned to reality following the kiss she had given him a small nod. As though she understood why he had done it, and that she was glad that he did.

"Not really. I've had my fair share of scrapes in my time in the army. And the raptors. Nothing I can't handle." And Claire nervously brought her fingertips back down onto the cut that was starting the slow healing process. She lightly traced along the edges of the cut, coming to the end and continuing to lightly trace his skin, this time on his left shoulder and upper arm. His skin felt so warm on her hands that were notoriously cold all the time, and as she ran her fingers slowly along his skin she felt the old rough scars he had sustained in his lifetime. "I noticed while you were sleeping that you have a nasty cut on your back." He said, and she brought her eyes from her fingers up to his eyes as he spoke. "It's probably the material sticking to wound as it's trying to heal." He had a look of guilt on his face, and her heart tumbled, not knowing why he looked like that. It had been her decision to go deeper into the park with him. Her injuries were her problem. Her fault. Not his. "I'm sorry, I should have got one of the doctors over to you in the hanger to check you over. They probably could've given you some pain killers or something…" his sentence trailed off into silence, his eyes trailing down to her legs that were against his leg. Claire continued to look at him, a small smile on her face. She couldn't believe how nice he was. The cocky, cheeky Owen Grady was, in his own sort of way, actually rather sweet. Her smile grew and she moved her head so she was back in his eye-line, and he lifted his head back up as she spoke:

"I thought you knew me better than that Mr Grady? There was no way I would have accepted any assessment from a doctor." And to her relief she saw a broad smile stretch across Owen's face as he let out a small chuckle.

"Yeah, that's true." He said. Claire had noticed that in her attempt to get him to look at her again she had rested her right hand on the top of his left hand as he gripped the bedsheets in his lap. She looked down as he twisted his hand around and they interlocked their fingers. As she looked up her green eyes caught his hazel, and they remained in that position for several minutes, with content smiles on their faces, as Owen affectionately swirled the fingertips of his right hand on the back of her right hand that was entwined with his left hand. Claire could feel her heart hammering against her chest with excitement. This was the first time she had ever felt at total peace with another person. It was as though the whole world could end today and she wouldn't care, because she would have spent her final hours the happiest she had ever been in her life. And it was all thanks to the man sat with her. Was this…was this what being in love felt like? What finding 'the one' felt like?

The old Claire Dearing from the morning before would've strode up to her, taken her by the shoulders, and shook her violently for thinking such stupid thoughts. Especially about Owen Grady of all men. But the Claire Dearing who was now sat on that bed, almost reborn, couldn't even bear to think of spending another day without him.

The room was silent, except for the almost inaudible sounds of the couple's steady breathing, and Claire sat herself up a little straighter, relieving the weight she had been putting on her left hand. Instead she brought it up to Owen's face and placed it affectionately on his right cheek, smoothing her thumb gently over a patch of his stubble. She held her breath, though it didn't register in her mind, and she leant towards him, tenderly placing her mouth on his. This kiss was short, sweet, and fleeting. But as they parted, their faces only remained an inch away, as goofy grins spread across their faces and they lightly grazed the tips of their noses against each other, before leaning back in for another short, sweet, fleeting kiss. Claire felt Owen bring his right hand up to her left cheek and cup it. They continued this routine of grazing noses, gently kissing, grazing noses, gently kissing with smiles on their faces for what felt like a lifetime, neither knowing nor caring what the time of day was, because no time mattered while they were together. It was as though time stood still.


	8. Sunset Selfies & The Handshake

p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"Owen felt lost in a daydream as he felt the soft skin of Claire's face in his right hand, her nose grazing his, his nose grazing hers, before their mouths met again and they briefly kissed before returning back to grazing noses. He couldn't help the smile on his face. He had never felt this kind of connection with any woman before in his life, and as he felt her lips against his once again it was as though their short past prior to yesterday morning had never style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"Owen kept his hands stuffed in his board short pockets angrily as he followed Claire along the docks towards Bill's Seafood Restaurant. This was the worst date he had ever been on. The woman he was with was like a siren. She was stunning, alluring, but as soon as you were reeled in she was your worst nightmare. She had taken it upon herself to walk a pace or two ahead of him since they had left Jack's Hawaiian Bar, and her entire aura projected aggravation. The sun was beginning to start its slow decent to the horizon, turning the once bright blue sky into a brilliant pink colour, but the couple did not notice it, having each lived on the island long enough that the glorious daily sunsets were no longer a novelty./span span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"Owen found himself scowling at the couples that stood here and there on the edge of the docks, taking selfies with the sunset behind them. They all looked so happy. /span span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"So/span span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" in love. Why couldn't Claire be happier? She could at least make an effort to force happiness. Maybe that way the night wouldn't be so torturous? Without realising, Owen found himself reaching out and grabbing the young woman's hand to prevent her from walking. It was enough to make her stop, and turn to look at him, but she snatched her hand back. The look she gave him reminded him of the type of face a child would pull when they weren't getting their own way and were angry about it. With a sigh he placed his hands on his hips:/span span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;""span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"What are we doing here?" he asked honestly, a question that seemed to have chipped away at her icy wall, and he saw her shake her head slowly, tears shining in her eyes as she looked from him out to the sunset. A gentle warm breeze trickled over the docks, causing her long red hair to move delicately with it. He saw her /spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"shrug, and/spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" noticed her fingers had begun playing with the zip of her clutch thoughtfully. "All I wanted to do was take you out for dinner, to apologise for the coffee spillage last year, and the fact that I didn't make it to the docks to meet you last year, and you really haven't been willing to make this a good date." It was the alcohol that had made him talk so honestly, and perhaps with a more exasperated tone than he would've used had he not drank all that tequila./spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"He saw Claire turn her head and glare at him with her bright green eyes, "Well I'm sorry I don't know how to have a good date!" Owen closed his eyes briefly with a sigh. That wasn't what he had meant. He knew she hadn't been on many dates and that they hadn't all gone well. He meant that she should just try to not focus on the bad points and instead focus on the good points. And maybe try to not bring work into the equation, particularly if she was going to make negative comments about his raptors. But before he could say any of that Claire continued, "I'm sorry that I planned where we could go, even though you specifically told me that if I wanted to /span span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"I/span span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" could look into it!" she didn't stop for breath and Owen was started to get a little annoyed with the sound of her voice that was gradually getting louder, "And I'm sorry that I'm such a disappointment to you."/span span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;""span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"You're not a disappointment-" Owen began but Claire snorted, cutting him off almost immediately "-Oh please, no body has that many tequilas on a first date if they're enjoying it!"/spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;""span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"How would you know?" started Owen, his voice also beginning to rise as his frustration increased. "Maybe that's how first dates are nowadays. Maybe I was drinking them because I was feeling relaxed in your company?" He knew it was a lie, he was drinking them to try to get through the date, but he wasn't going to say that because it would give her the high ground to know she was right. She knew she was right though, he could tell by the way she let go of her bag and brought a finger up towards him./spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;""span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"You just got annoyed because I told you not to get too attached to your precious raptors!" she yelled at /spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"him, and/spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" turned on her heels to continue down the docks, still headed for Bill's Seafood Restaurant, and he followed her. Both ignored the couples who had once been taking selfies of themselves and were now watching the argument between the raptor trainer and the Senior Parks Coordination and Assets Manager. One woman muttered to her boyfriend about how horrendously attractive the two looked, even though both Owen and Claire wore scowls as they stalked down the docks./spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;""span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"Of course/spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" I got annoyed! You have no right telling me how I should feel-" started Owen but Claire cut him off again whilst swivelling around to face him, and it was frustrating him to no end./spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;""span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"I'm not telling you how to /spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"feel/spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;", Owen! You've already shown me tonight how you feel!" And all of a /spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"sudden/spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" their yelling stopped. Their faces were inches from each other but they were too angry to notice, as they both breathed irrationally heavy. They had a good amount of people dotted around the docks looking over at them, wondering who they were, what their story was, and what they could be arguing about. But the couple hadn't noticed as they glared at each other./spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"Reluctantly, Owen was the first to back down, and he took a step backwards from Claire, who had now crossed her arms over her chest. His voice was low, and he almost sounded defeated, "You know what, let's just relax. Let's go to Bill's, have some food, we don't have to talk. We'll just go, eat, and then leave." There was a high chance the reason the woman in front of him was angry was because she was hungry, he knew that was probably the reason why he had also argued with her the way he had. That and the alcohol that was still in his system. Maybe a bit of food would even things out and they may be able to make it to the Twinkle Tent after all. Owen grimaced internally at the name. He waited patiently for her response, and when her silence became too much for him, he motioned for her to follow and he stepped past her, continuing to walk to the restaurant. But to his surprise, and slight frustration, she didn't follow. He stopped and looked back at her. She had turned on the spot to watch him go, but that was as much as she'd done./span span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"Owen gave her a questioning look and she shook her head gently, her face having fallen, her eyes glassy again with tears. "I can't do this." He heard her say and he couldn't help the long sigh he let out as he slowly walked back towards her./span span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;""span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"What are you talking about?" He asked, in a tone that made her sound like she was being crazy. It was a small relief to him that she was about to bring this evening to an early close, but a part of him had also been so sure that things were turning around for them. When she had asked him about his brothers it had shocked him. No woman he had ever dated had ever asked him about his family before. He hadn't told anyone about his brother's death. Not even when he had been a kid. He'd never talked about it. Yet there was something about Claire Dearing that had made him want to share that tiny piece of tragic information from his past with her./spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;""span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"It's obvious we're never going to get along. We've been in each other's company for almost two hours and we've already had two arguments. Both because of work!" Owen paused, thinking back on the past couple of hours and realising he only remembered snippets of it. But she was right, their last argument being a shouting match out in public. Public with whom most had lost interest in the couple and had moved on from their viewing spots on the docks. "There's nothing here. We're just not right for each other." He heard her finish. Owen blinked at Claire, who looked at him with a realistic expression on her face. Most people who went on first dates together weren't always suited to begin with. She of course didn't know that because she was so out of the dating game. Owen wanted to make her understand./spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;""span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"Look /spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"it's/spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" just dinner we have to get through. After that we can go our separate ways. That's just the way some dates go." He said, his belly rumbling. They just had to get some food into their systems. And perhaps more tequila. But Claire looked at him sadly, shaking her head slowly with a long sigh, and Owen knew what she was going to say. Her voice was soft again and sad./spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;""span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"We shouldn't /spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"have/spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" to get through anything, Owen. It should just be…I don't know…easy. Exciting. And I don't feel that. Do you?" Owen found himself shaking his head, when he honestly didn't know how he felt. It was enough of an answer for Claire, who pursed her lips together, quickly wiping a rogue tear that had dared to roll down her cheek. She held her hand out towards him, with a small smile, and he looked down at it. This was it. She was actually ending the date early. The first date he had ever been on that was a failure in under two hours. In /spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"fact/spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" the only date he had been on that had been a failure full stop. "I'll see you at work, Mr Grady."/spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;""span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"Owen." He found himself saying immediately following her formally addressing him. He took her hand, which felt cool within his warm grasp, and they shook hands./spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;""span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"We're colleagues Mr Grady, remember?" He heard her remind him and he sighed, the smile that had been on his face falling a little. He shook his head in disbelief that she was insisting on ending the calm finale of the terrible date with formalities. Once a boss always a boss. Letitia had really trained the young woman well. "Don't be like that." He heard her say in a nagging tone, and he dropped her hand. "We have to be professional." She continued, but Owen had already stopped listening to her./spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;""span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"I'll see you around." He said, and walked past her, hands stuffed back in his board short pockets as he sulked. He continued down the docks, her final words ringing around his head. 'We have to be professional'. Trust her to insist on remaining professional even when they were off the clock. Sure, they weren't away from the park, but they weren't /spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"at/spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" work. He maintained his quick, sulky pace as he headed towards his favourite bar, Whistlers, which was unfortunately located three bars down from Sheridan's Shack. He would have to walk past the bar he'd been chucked out of earlier. The thought of which made him realise how sober he was beginning to feel. A tiny part of him wondered if Claire was following, and when he felt far enough along the docks, he turned back. She was no longer where he had left her. She was gone. He had no idea when he would ever see her again. For /spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"now/spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" though, he feared she would haunt his dreams again, her long red hair drifting down the length of her back as she reached out to him…/spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"Owen took a deep shuddering breath as the fleeting kisses he and Claire had been sharing were now getting longer, their breaks between getting shorter. They had let go of each other's hands now, Owen taking advantage of his left hand's freedom by snaking it over Claire's right hip and around her lower back, pulling her closer to him. His right hand had drifted from her left cheek round to the back of her head, his fingers tangled in her red locks. Meanwhile he noticed Claire had removed her hand from his cheek the moment he had begun pulling her towards him and instead had wrapped her left arm around his neck. Her right hand, which was no longer entwined with his, now cupped his left cheek as she pulled him into deeper kisses. He slid her closer, her ass now sat on his left thigh as their kisses no longer had breaks between them, and he lightly caressed her right thigh, from her hip to her knee and back style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"All of a sudden an irritating chirpy ringtone sounded from the chair on the other side of the room. Owen felt Claire freeze, before letting out a long disappointing sigh and groan, her lips still locked in his. Reluctantly, Owen pulled away, opening his eyes as he snapped back into reality, though keeping the smile on his face when he found his face still inches from Claire's. He definitely wasn't dreaming this style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;""That'll be my sister." He heard her whisper to him in aggravation, whilst briefly looking across the room at where the ringing was coming from. The ringing stopped and Claire returned her attention back to him. He saw her bring her face closer and rub the tip of her nose against his, "She'll want to check that I'm okay."span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;""You seem okay to me." Owen replied with a cheeky grin, and his heart leapt as Claire chuckled quietly and nodded before returning her lips back to his, to resume what they had started. This time the couple wasted no time in intensifying their kisses, with Owen all the while making a conscious effort to not touch the area of her back where he knew her wound was. But the passion sharply stopped when the cell began ringing again. This time Owen joined Claire in groaning at the style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;""I'll quickly see what she wants, then tell her not to bother us anymore." Claire said, and to Owen's surprise she gave him a wink and cheeky grin, before rolling off his left thigh, and crawling over to the other side of the bed that she had once been asleep on. He watched as she tentatively walked over to the chair, her feet still causing her some levels of discomfort, and pulled up their towels they had each left on there when they got dressed. Feeling down the side of the cushion of the chair, Claire pulled out her grubby cell phone that continued ringing. She looked over at Owen, rolling her eyes, and he could tell that she had been right. It was her sister. He watched her as she answered the phone, and admired her choice of clothing to go to sleep in. Or lack of as the case may be. He wasn't really listening to the woman's conversation until he heard the conversation begin to get a little style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;""We're not hungry, Karen!" Owen looked up at Claire's face and saw that she had been watching him, a grin on her face, and he knew she had caught him checking her out. She had let out a little giggle, and judging from her response, it hadn't gone by her sister unnoticed. "Owen was just making me laugh…yeah yeah, I laughed, hell has frozen over, nice one Karen." Owen smirked at Claire's sarcasm as she slowly wandered towards the bathroom door, then turned on the spot, and slowly began wandering back towards the chair. "Erm, I don't know. I'll ask him…" And he saw Claire turn back to him, holding her cell towards her collarbone, with a smile on her face, "They're going down to dinner in about 10 minutes. They wondered if we wanted to go with them."span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"Owen shuffled his weight on the bed a little. He was feeling span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"slightly/span uncomfortable in the position he was in, yet fortunately the sheets were well gathered on his lap. All of a sudden his stomach rumbled at the idea that he may have a chance to eat, a rumble so loud that Claire heard it, and they both giggled. Owen heard Claire's sister yell something excitably down the phone at her, though he wasn't sure what it was, and he watched as Claire resumed the conversation with her big sister, "Yes I laughed again, I get it Karen, it's a big deal. Look, I think we're going to take you up on the offer of dinner…okay…well we'll pop to yours in 5…" Owen quickly held both of his hands up, motioning to her with his fingers spread wide, which made Claire giggle again, "…no 10 minutes time…" and Owen grinned as Claire ended the conversation with her sister and chucked her cell on top of the towels. He watched her as she slowly walked around the bed so she faced him, a content smile on her face. Owen's heart hammered against his chest as she bent over towards him, bringing her face an inch from his, with each of her hands on his knees, her voice low and seductive. "You're going to need to put some more clothes on, Mr Grady." And she placed a quick, teasing peck on his lips before walking around to the bathroom, picking up the skirt that her sister had dropped round on the way, leaving Owen to stare at the window with a goofy grin on his style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p 


	9. The Confession & Used Towel

The morning light sifted uninhibitedly through the netted curtains of the hotel suite, with barely a sound forcing its way into the peaceful room. Claire opened her eyes blearily, looking up at the white ceiling, and noticing the sunshine from outside reflecting off the small chandelier above the bed she was lying on. She went to bring her hand to her eyes to rub them, as she did every morning, but she found her left hand lolled above her head on her pillow, the fingertips tangled with another hand. Her right hand lay lazily on the bare skin of her stomach, but had another hand on top of it. She smiled, knowing exactly who the hands belonged to, and the sound of his deep sigh in her right ear confirmed it.

Yesterday evening hadn't exactly gone the way they had hoped. They had gone over to Karen's hotel suite to find her in tears whilst arguing with her husband. The boys had locked themselves in the bathroom, refusing to go to dinner. Claire had attempted to calm down the quarrelling parents while Owen had slipped away from the confrontation, choosing to sit on the floor with Zach and Grey who had willingly let him into the bathroom. Claire wasn't sure what he had said to them, but within an hour the whole family, along with Claire and Owen, were sat at a large dinner table in the hotel's restaurant. Then the couple had taken it upon themselves to slip back to their hotel room, to finish what they had started earlier that evening.

Claire smiled again as she remembered the desperate kisses she had stolen with Owen each time they were left alone in the elevator that took them up to the floor their suite was on. The way she had giggled as they had ran, hand-in hand, from the elevator to their suite. A stark difference to the first time they had arrived at the door. Owen had snatched the key from her hand when she had fumbled to unlock the door in excitement, and had unlocked it in one swift move, giving her time to grab the neck of his t-shirt and pull him through the door, kissing him forcefully, lustfully, as she did so.

That had been almost ten hours ago. Claire looked to her left at the travel clock her sister had kindly given them when she'd handed Owen their replacement clothes the previous afternoon, though he had failed to tell her they had it until she wondered what the time had been around midnight. 8.30am. They hadn't had much in the way of sleep, having rushed to get into bed together initially, and then taking their time the second time around. And the third. And the forth… In fact Claire had lost count to the point that the whole of the night's activities had rolled into one until finally, breathless and exhausted, they collapsed back onto their hotel bed, and immediately fell asleep. She heard him take a deep breath and nuzzle her right ear.

"Good morning." She heard him whisper groggily in her ear with a blatant smile apparent by his tone of voice, which made her smile wider. She turned to him to look at his face, to check the person curled up in bed with her was definitely him. It was definitely Owen. She wasn't making it up. "Good morning." She said with a smile, and happily let him lean over to kiss her softly on the lips.

Claire watched as Owen shook his head in disbelief, his face falling, a reaction she hadn't been expecting. She had merely reminded him that they were colleagues. If they weren't going to be dating, and Claire was adamant that they were never going to be dating, then all they were to each other was colleagues. And as such, she was going to address him formally, as Letitia had once told her to do. It was the way to gain respect from other members of staff that she needed to lead or would one day be leading. And boy, did she need to gain respect from the man stood before her, in his silly scruffy board shorts. "Don't be like that." She found herself saying more sternly than she had intended. He dropped her hand and it fell to her side like lead. Her heart lurched as she dared to feel almost lost without it wrapped around hers. It was too late to drop the serious act now. If she changed her approach to a softer one she would never get his respect at work and he would be a nightmare to manage, "We have to be professional." She found herself reminding him. She had wanted to almost plead with him to understand, but he had a face of thunder which made her feel defensive.

"I'll see you around." She heard him say angrily, and he just walked past her, back the way they came. Claire had frozen. How had that goodbye got so out of hand? She realised she had her mouth open slightly, shocked at how abruptly this terrible date had ended. She knew she had done the right thing, that choosing to brooch the subject of not continuing to the restaurant was a good move on her behalf, but she had never anticipated the calm, realistic conversation to have turned sour in it's final moments. So much of herself was screaming at her not to look back at him, but she was tired, and in a moment of weakness she looked over her shoulder. Owen continued stalking up the docks away from her, his hands in the pockets of those board shorts. Claire grimaced. Board shorts. As if he wore board shorts. On a date!

With a small sigh Claire turned and walked down a side street that she knew would take her away from the docks. One of the management offices wasn't too far away from where she was, so she began making her way towards that. She would call her driver to come pick her up from there. She couldn't wait until her new car arrived next week, then she wouldn't need to keep borrowing the company car during the day and use a driver to take her between work and home.

As she paced down the street she walked past couples, families, all of whom where visiting Isla Nublar on holiday. Several of them looked at her, smiling at her as she passed. She had really made an effort to look nice this evening. Well, she always made an effort, but this had been her opportunity to look less…corporate. To be herself. If only for one night. She had ensured her new assistant Zara had cleared her diary from 5pm to give Claire a chance to get ready. She was the boss, she could cancel her meetings if she wanted to. Claire had driven straight to her house after Owen had asked her out again, which wasn't located as far from the new raptor pen as she had first thought, and had picked up a few things to change into once she returned to her office. She had chosen to wear her favourite green dress that she hadn't had a chance to wear in years, but had brought with her when she had moved to the island just in case. She had used her hair straighteners to actually give her long red hair a loose-wave look. She had picked out her favourite hair clip that her mother had given her for her twenty first birthday. She had even cooled it with her work heels, choosing a slightly smaller heel, though a heel all the same. She felt human in heels. She had made all that effort for him. For herself. And now she was left to make her way home, at 9pm. Two hours after her date had begun.

Claire opened her bag and reached in for her cell. She pulled out the small envelope that contained her meticulously laminated menus and maps, looking at it briefly for a moment, before angrily throwing it into a bin she walked past. She wasn't going to need them again any time soon. She reached back in the bag, took hold of her cell, and flicked through her contacts, trying to find the name of someone who she could talk to about her awful evening. But as she came to the letter Z at the end of her contacts it suddenly hit her that there was nobody she could call. Her finger hovered over Zara's name, but she quickly retracted it. She had to remain professional. Zara was her assistant. If she decided to tell her about how the date had really gone it would mean she would have shared something about her personal life. Something personal to her. And then the line between colleagues and friends would be blurred. So Claire placed her cell back in her bag, and walked up the steps to the office with a heavy heart.

She couldn't even call her sister. She hadn't seen her sister in five years. They had only contacted each other in the form of Christmas cards and birthday cards. She always sent her nephews birthday and Christmas presents, which were often freebies she had received through work. She was good at that much. It wasn't like she couldn't afford to buy them gifts. Her job came with a house, a car, a driver, an assistant, a company card for food and drinks from the park. She could easily afford to buy her nephews each a house if she wanted. Particularly since her promotion now meant she was earning over a third more than she had been when she had first been hired at the park. But it was more the case that she had no idea what her nephews liked. She wasn't even sure how old they were. Which was her fault for only writing their names in her calendar on their birthday dates instead of how old they would be too.

Claire and her older sister had clashed badly for the final time five years ago, at their grandfather's 90th birthday party. Karen had teased her that she was too career focused and was going to end up alone if she carried on putting her career before finding a husband and starting a family. Claire had snapped back that she would rather she wasn't in Karen's position, stating the only answer the older sister had had to keep her crumbling marriage 'alive' was to get pregnant with her youngest son, Grey. The sisters had stopped talking that day, and hadn't seen each other since, much to their mother's dismay.

An hour later and Claire slipped out of her heels, not being able to bear the sound of them echoing back at her to remind her that she had returned to her empty house alone again. She hung her bag up on a coat hook by the door. She didn't pause to flick the light on and look at her empty lounge, she knew nothing was different. She pattered across the wooden floor in her bare feet, and slowly up the wide shallow staircase to the top floor of her home. She continued along the landing, her bare feet still pattering as she walked past three doors, two belonging to spare bedrooms that had been furnished before she moved in, and one belonging to a large bathroom. At the end of the landing she entered through a door into her bedroom, the only room she spent time in during the limited moments she was at home. She flicked the light switch on, and small lights, almost like fairy lights, lit the room. To any outsider the bedroom looked tranquil, with the dim lights offering a place of sanctuary. But this was the only place Claire forced herself to go to. She wasn't much of a sleeper. The only TV she watched was the news, which she watched from her iPad. All she did in this room was read novels. And lay on her bed, often wide awake, mulling over the past day, her past life, the next day, and her future. The difference between tonight and the previous nights she had come home, was that she had been let down. Let down by Owen Grady. But more so, let down by herself. She had been given the perfect opportunity to get to know someone who she knew nothing about outside of her working hours. Someone to actually spend the evening with. To be given the chance to talk about more than just work, but about herself too. And she had blown it because of the commitment she had to her job. Claire sighed heavily and moved over to her bed, crawling onto it and laying back, her head hitting the pillow as she looked up at the ceiling, and her eyes began to fill with tears.

Claire closed her eyes, her head remaining on the pillow as she felt Owen deepen the kiss he was planting on her mouth. She brought her hand up to his chest and pushed it up slightly, causing him to stop and look at her with a small look of confusion. "I have a confession." she heard herself say, and she saw his face drop as she bit her bottom lip nervously. "This doesn't sound good..." he replied, and her heart hammered against her chest so quickly she wondered if he could hear it, "You remember the first time we were supposed to go on a date? And you felt terrible because you'd been so caught up with work that you never made it to the docks?"

She watched him hesitated, as he cautiously said yes, not sure what she was going to say, "Well...I had been caught in a long meeting at work so...I never made it to the docks either." She held her breath, terrified that he would get angry with her, like he had done a couple of years ago at the end of their official first date. Instead he paused, his mouth open in shock, though the corners of his lips revealed a smile, "And you made me feel so guilty about standing you up!"

"No," she quickly replied, grinning at the man who looked at her, eagerly awaiting her comeback, "I never once complained!"

"But you never gave me any reason to believe that I hadn't stood you up." And Claire paused, looking at his eyes as he grinned at her. He was right, she had just allowed him to apologise and apologise. She covered her face with her hands, embarrassed that she had been caught out, and she heard him giggle while she spoke.

"I'm a horrible person." she whined beneath her fingers, but as soon as she finished her statement she felt his right hand peel her hands from her face,

"No you're not," he said, and Claire almost felt like melting as he continued to grin at her. "You just hate being wrong."

She chuckled at his honest comment, bringing her hands up to the back of his head and pulling his lips back to hers. A loud knock came from the hotel room door, and the couple both groaned with a sigh as they broke their kiss. Claire looked at Owen apologetically as she heard her sister calling out to her from outside the hotel room.

"Claire, it's me. Can I come in?"

She saw Owen fall onto his back with a smile on his face and she tugged the bedsheets off him, giggling as he quickly moved to sit on the edge of his side of the bed to conceal his body a little better. Claire wrapped the bed sheets around her naked body, and slowly made her way over to the hotel suite door as her sister continued knocking ferociously from outside the room. She peered back at Owen, just in time to see his ass dashing into the bathroom, closing the door behind him. She heard the shower start and she smiled before unlocking and opening the hotel suite door.

Claire saw her sister take one look at her and roll her eyes. "Well no wonder you've not been replying to my messages." Karen said with a teasing voice, peering over the red head's shoulder almost hopefully. When she saw there was no naked Owen in the room her face almost dropped slightly, and Claire stepped aside so her big sister could enter.

"What's up Karen?" Claire asked, as her sister looked around the room, at the clothes splayed across the floor. She could remember helping Owen take his t-shirt off last night, but she couldn't remember throwing it at the indoor plant it now hung off.

"You need to watch the news." She heard her sister say, and Claire's stomach flipped. The park. Being with Owen had somehow helped her forget that there were other things happening in the world other than the two of them. She walked tentatively over to the large television that stood in the lounge section of the suite, and reached for the remote. Before she switched the TV on she heard her sister gasp. "Claire. Your back." Claire turned to look at her sister's horrified expression. She had forgotten all about the wound on her back the moment the pain killers Owen had got from the hotel reception had begun to work.

"Oh…yeah…" she had found herself saying, but it hadn't been enough for her sister who now looked at her bare feet, that had so much dark skin peeling from where the blood blisters had been around her toes and heels. "…I'm okay though Karen. Owen, he…" and as she said his name, his voice sounded from the bathroom.

"Er…Claire?" the women looked over as the bathroom door opened a bit, and Owen stuck his soggy face around it to look at them, "Could you just pass me one of the towels?" he grinned at them and Claire looked fleetingly embarrassed as she glanced at her sister's teasing face, before walking over to the chair where they had both piled their towels, picking one up and walking over to the bathroom door. She let Owen steal a quick wet kiss as he took the towel gratefully from her hands, giving her a cheeky wink as he did so, before closing the door. Claire couldn't help the smile that grew on her face as she brought her hand up to her mouth, her fingers tracing her lips where he had kissed her post-shower. She turned and her sister was beaming at her.

"So Owen huh?" Karen asked rhetorically, and Claire rolled her eyes, but kept the smile on her face. Yeah. Owen.


	10. Satellite Call & A Realisation

"You know you could always run away? Come back to New York with us?"

Owen stood by the car, listening to Claire's sister plead with the red-head not to let them leave her. But he saw Claire put her hands on Karen's shoulders to hold eye contact, with a small shake of her head, "I can't leave. The responsibility of what happens with the park, dealing with all the consequences of what happened, it's all down to me, Karen. It's my job."

Owen was sat on the edge of the bed of the hotel suite, and immediately drew his eyes to the front door as someone unlocked it. And that someone was Claire. She had been summoned to a satellite call with Misrani's Board of Directors, which the hotel had kindly closed one of their function rooms for. She had confessed to him before going down there that she feared they were going to fire her, but Owen couldn't imagine they would. None of what had happened on that island had been her fault. She had been with Misrani's company for years. There was no way they would just fire her. The thing that Owen feared the most was that the company would decide to kill every living thing left on that island. Including his last remaining raptor, Blue.

Owen watched as Claire stepped through the door. Her expression was that of utter shock. She had been gone for almost three hours, and Owen stood up expectantly, desperate to hear what had been discussed in the meeting. He watched her slowly walk towards him, stopping at the bed and sitting on it.

"Well?" Owen found himself asking. She appeared to be staring at an empty space in front of her, but when he spoke she looked up at him, speaking slowly, almost in disbelief:

"They want to keep the island…" Owen took a double take and understood her shock. She continued talking, "…demolish the park but…keep the land."

While that wasn't what Owen was expecting to hear, it didn't exactly answer his deepest burning question, "What about the animals? Blue. The T-Rex…" but he stopped as she looked at him with tears in her eyes, shaking her head slowly. He fell onto the bed on her right side, his heart missing a beat as he began to feel frustrated. Why couldn't they just leave the island alone? It was done now. The damage had been done. There were no dinosaurs there that could put the rest of the world in danger. They would be confined to the island. To Isla Nublar . Why eliminate them?

"Owen, we adjourned the meeting. We're resuming it again tomorrow." He felt Claire take his hand and he looked up at her. A few tears had now ran down her face, but her expression was serious. Determined. "I'm going to fight this. Them. Nothing is going to happen to Blue while I'm still in charge of that island."

Owen nodded, a small grateful smile on his face, "So they haven't fired you then?"

"Not yet they haven't." Claire replied with a sigh, bringing a tired hand to her face and she rubbed her eyes, accidentally smearing a bit of makeup that she had put on before the call. She didn't notice and looked away from him thoughtfully, shaking her head slightly, "They want me to issue a statement to the press tomorrow evening. I'm discussing with the board what I'll have to say in tomorrow's meeting."

Owen watched the woman beside him groan before falling backwards onto the bed. Twenty-four hours ago she had been falling onto that bed for a different reason. Now they were hanging in limbo, waiting to find out their next moves. "Everything's such a mess." He heard her groan into her hands, and he looked down at her.

Owen wondered what had happened to the sharp, aggressive business woman he had so often disliked back when they had worked in the park. The woman who refused to crack a real smile. The woman who refused to talk about anything other than work. The woman who refused to let any fear spread across her face in case it terrified those around her. The woman who refused to take no for an answer. And it suddenly occurred to him that perhaps this was the real Claire Dearing. Not the uptight, bossy, control-freak Claire Dearing who was corporate from head to foot. She was a beautiful woman with real fears, real worries, and real emotions. And all of those fears, and worries, and emotions she had been sharing with him over the past twenty-four hours. Probably without even realising she was doing it. She trusted him. She respected him. Finally! The main reason he had told himself that they would have never gone on a second date back in the day had been because they didn't respect each other. What a difference two days in each other's company had made. "What?" he heard her ask, and he jumped as he realised he had been staring at her. Instead of saying anything though, he leant back and laid beside her, turning his head to the left to look at her. He took her hand and brought it down to their sides, squeezing it slightly as he did so as a way of reassuring her.

"I'm not going anywhere. You know that right?" He found himself saying, and he worried for a moment that Claire might cry again. But she didn't. Instead she let out a heavy sigh, shifting her head closer to his so their noses were almost touching. A calm smile washed over her face, she let out a quiet "Thank you", and he kissed the tip of her nose.

Owen shuffled his feet uncomfortably as he watched the two sisters embrace, tears rolling down the big sister's cheeks. It had been a very exhausting three days since Claire's first satellite call with Misrani's Board of Directors. That perfect night spent alone with Claire when they had first arrived at the hotel seemed like a lifetime ago. The Board had decided by the second day that the heads of each of Misrani's businesses had now been put in full charge of their respective business and as such Claire was now running Isla Nublar indefinitely. While she had to pass all of her decisions by The Board, Claire had immediately insisted that the animals left on the island were re-captured as opposed to killed, presuming that all of their pens were still intact. There they could decide what to do with the assets (a term, according to Claire, that was now used frequently by The Board, but no longer by her). The Board had agreed when they realised they may be able to sell many of the smaller dinosaurs to zoo's around the world. It was always about the money for them. Owen hadn't complained when Claire had returned to their hotel suite with a relieved smile on her face, telling him that Blue would be okay. So long as they could find her when they returned to the island.

The couple had discussed together the possibility of returning to the island after Claire's third and final satellite meeting with The Board. She had told him she was expected to go back to lead the team that would be re-capturing the animals, and he had wasted no time in telling her that he would be going with her, to which she had smiled saying she had expected nothing less from him. It would be in a matter of days, with The Board wanting to utilise the fact that power was still working over on the island, but they couldn't guarantee for how long the power would run for. The sooner a team was on the island, the sooner they could assess the damage.

Naturally Claire's sister had been horrified to hear that her little sister would be going back to the island to track down and capture the dinosaurs that were loose and roaming freely, putting herself back in danger again. But Claire had been insistent, and Karen soon gave up talking about it, with her impending divorce date looming. Her soon-to-be ex-husband had returned to the family home the second morning the family had been at the hotel, to speak further with his divorce lawyer. Not that the kids knew anything about it.

Owen heard a little voice chirp next to his arm and he turned to see Zach and Grey had sidled up to him, "You going to be okay?" asked Grey, who looked up at him worried. Owen forced a smile, nodding at the two boys confidently, "Yeah. Everything's going to be fine."

The bathroom door closed behind Owen, and he walked over to Grey, who sat miserably on the bathroom floor, his back leant against the wall as he held his knees up to his chest. His cheeks were tear stained. Owen sat directly next to the kid with a long sigh, as Zach sat the other side of his little brother.

"I hate it when they fight." Grey blubbed. Owen leant his head back against the bathroom wall. He thought back to his childhood. He knew what it was like to live in a pressured household. After his brother died his mother and father were always yelling, blaming each other in one way or another. What if one had been watching the kids more frequently than the other? What if one hadn't nagged his brother as the final thing they had said to him? All the arguments and blame had turned the home into a difficult place to live, until one day his father just left. Left the house for good. And Owen never saw him again.

"I used to hate it when my parents fought too," Owen found himself saying, before sighing again. "But, sometimes that's just what parents do." He looked over at Zach, before looking down at Grey, "They don't do it because they don't love you guys though. They do it because they love you guys so much that they don't want to take their frustrations out on either of you…"

"So they take it out on each other?" Grey asked, his big watery blue eyes looking up at Owen, who had no choice but to nod.

"Couples argue all the time Grey, but it doesn't mean they don't care about each other." Zach tried to reason, and Owen nodded along.

"Do you and Aunt Claire argue?" Owen paused, not expecting that question from the curious ten year old. Did he and Claire argue? They used to. They had argued badly on their first date two years ago. Now they mostly bickered. Well, again they used to. They bickered most of yesterday, from the moment she had arrived at his bungalow to take him to see the I-Rex they had been bickering. Then as they spent more time together the bickering subsided. To the point that they now no longer bickered. They had both been through a traumatic event. They had been through it together. And there was nobody else in the whole world who knew exactly what Owen had been through except for Claire.

"Not so much." And he saw Grey's face fall, "But I'm not saying we'll never argue." He quickly continued, finding it difficult to see the kid looking so disappointed, "Your Aunt doesn't like being told if she's wrong, especially when she knows that she is, so we'll probably argue then?" He stopped his sentence, and realised that he had been talking about Claire as though they were in a relationship. As though he was going to spend the foreseeable future with her. And that thought hadn't crossed his mind before now. He had been so wrapped up in the present that he hadn't thought about any sort of life outside of this hotel.

"So, you and Aunt Claire really are boyfriend and girlfriend then?" Zach asked, and Owen let a small smile grow in the corners of his mouth. It was weird to hear someone say it.

"I don't know kid." He responded honestly.

"Do you want to be boyfriend and girlfriend?" Grey asked, his small voice sounding so innocent. Owen thought about it. He'd never had the whole 'girlfriend – wife – kids – family' vision for his life in the past. He was a lone wolf. A serial dater. He slept with whichever woman he wanted. But now he thought about it, he didn't want to be that man anymore. Now he thought back on how it had felt to be kissed so affectionately, and to kiss so affectionately, as he had done with Claire earlier that afternoon. He had felt as though throughout the time in his life leading up to that moment he'd been missing something and he realised it had been her. She made him feel whole again. And he was now beginning to think that having a girlfriend wasn't a terrible idea. And having Claire as his girlfriend. As 'The One'. Well that seemed like the best idea in the world.

"Yeah, I do." He said, almost surprised at the notion now that he admitted it out loud. Had he really just toyed with the thought that Claire was 'The One'? Had he…fallen in love? He could feel himself scrunching his nose up as he thought back to try to remember when he may have fallen.

"Does she?" Owen looked up at Zach who had asked him the question, and both boys were now looking at him curiously. Owen shrugged. He had no idea if she wanted them to be boyfriend and girlfriend. Her kisses earlier had given him the impression that she did. He hadn't thought about the label of 'boyfriend' whilst she had been awake though, so he hadn't been able to ask her. But then...should he ask her? It had been around thirty six hours since she had arrived at his bungalow. Before all hell had broken loose at the park. Was thirty six hours a little too soon to be asking for commitment?

"I hope so." Owen confessed.

"I hope so too." Said Grey.

"Me too" agreed Zach.

They were giving Owen reassuring smiles. He was surprised that they had managed to sneak such a serious conversation out of him. The arguing outside the room had stopped and Owen had no idea how long it had been quiet for. They heard a light tapping on the door, followed by Claire, who eased her way into the bathroom, gently closing the door behind her. The three males froze as they watched her walk over to them, a sympathetic look on her face as she knelt on the floor in front of them. Owen couldn't take his eyes off her. Especially now that he had realised all that he had realised during the conversation he had just had with her nephews. He was falling in love with her. He couldn't believe it.

"How you guys holding up?" she asked in a calm, concerned voice, and Owen saw her face turn to surprise when her nephews gave her little grins. They weren't okay. Owen knew it. He knew Claire knew it. But for now the secret that Owen really liked their Aunt was enough to mask the boy's pain. To his relief neither Zach nor Grey blabbed to her about what he had told them, and instead the oldest boy simply said "I think we're ready for some dinner." And he stood up, his younger brother doing the same, still grinning at his Aunt who watched them both walk out of the bathroom to find their parents, stunned at the turn-around in their moods.

Owen stood up with an exhausted sigh, holding his hand out towards Claire but she, unsurprisingly, didn't take it and chose to stand herself up. She looked at him curiously as she stepped towards him, affectionately wrapping her arm around his waist, maintaining her bright green eyes on his face, "What did you say to them?"

And Owen smiled as he looked down at her, "It's a secret" and as she opened her mouth to pursue the matter, he simply kissed her on the lips, before walking back into the bedroom, leaving her frozen to the spot in the bathroom.

"You promise me you'll take care of her please, Owen." Ordered Karen, as she walked over to him, pulling him into a fleeting hug.

"With my life" grinned Owen as he saw Claire roll her eyes and shake her head slightly at her older sister's fussing. He knew that Claire knew she was going to be okay, so long as they stuck together. They had helped each other get out of scrapes before, they could help each other again. As Karen stepped back, Grey hugged Owen's waist tightly, and Owen ruffled his hair before shaking hands with Zach.

"Good luck" the older boy muttered, before pulling his little brother away from the man. The boys hugged their Aunt who had walked over to join them. As they stepped away from her and back to their mother Owen could feel Claire standing right by his side, her arm pressed against his. He took that as an invitation, bringing his arm behind her, and placing his hand in the back pocket of her jeans. He could tell by the way Claire had shifted her body position so her hips were closer to him that this was what she had been requesting.

"Now don't forget, Christmas at ours okay?" Karen said to the couple.

"Okay, we'll see Karen" replied Claire with a chuckle.

"I mean it. And that's an invitation to both of you in case you weren't sure" and Owen noticed Karen's eyes glanced to her sister's waist as though she knew exactly where he had placed his hand.

"Well that will all depend if we've managed to re-capture the animals by then." Claire replied honestly. It was no secret to the couple that it was going to take a lot of time and hard work to capture most of the creatures on the island, particularly the T-Rex. As they watched the mother and sons roll their respective suitcases through the doors of the small airport of Costa Rica, Owen heard Claire sigh. He knew she was concerned. They had a lot of work ahead of them. He never shied away from hard work and he knew she didn't either, but their prospective work was unlike anything they had ever had to do before. "So, an invitation to my family's house for Christmas already. Not bad going, Mr Grady."

Owen grinned, bringing his arm back to his side as she turned her body to face him, a small smile on her face. He couldn't tear his eyes from hers as she stood, inches from his body, cocking her head slightly to the right, as though she were trying to read his mind. Seeing this only made Owen's grin grow, and he raised his eyebrows, "It must be because I'm so lovable."

His response made her giggle, and he watched her snake her arms around his waist. He was beginning to get used to her doing that. It had felt unusual at first, but every time she did it he took the opportunity to bring his arms around her too, linking his hands behind her back.

"That must be it." He heard her agree with a small nod, a broad smile on her face, and he felt her chest heave against his torso with a sigh as she looked up at him. Owen could feel his heart racing as he looked down into her green eyes, then leant down to kiss her lips. An action that she happily reciprocated, pulling him tightly against her, and he sighed into the kiss.


	11. Mouldy Fruit & A Serious Question

Claire hesitated as she brought her hand up to the fridge door. It had been fifteen days since she had been at her house on the island. Since then the park had turned into turmoil, with several dinosaurs being let loose and the surviving tourists being evacuated over to Costa Rica. She and Owen had saved her nephews and managed to get themselves off the island too. The boys had gone home with their mother ten days ago, leaving Claire and Owen to attend to their responsibilities of the park and the animals in it. They had lead the first team over to the island seven days ago, helping the task force to set up, and deciding on a plan of action to capture the loose animals. The power was still running on the island, which kept some of the zones on the island protected from any roaming dinosaurs, who each had chips embedded in their skin. Any time the animals got too close to the outskirts of the zones they received an electric shock. Any time they crossed into the zone they were stunned. And it was thanks to this piece of technology that had made the initial capture of many of the loose dinosaur's relatively straight forward over the course of the past few days, because a lot of them had strayed into the outer zones. The T-Rex was still loose though, and Blue hadn't been found yet, despite Owen having gone out on many day trips with his own sub-team to try to track her down.

Claire pulled the door of the fridge open and scrunched her nose up as the smell of mouldy fruit met her nostrils. Mouldy sliced watermelon had a particularly ghastly odour when it went off, and Claire was fairly certain it was the worst smell she had ever smelt. And working in a dinosaur park meant that she had smelt her fair share of bad smells. Her eyes moved from the bowl of mouldy fruit to the shelf above it that boasted several bottles of her favourite white wine. There used to be a time when she would come straight home from work and open one, sitting out in the rocking chair on the porch to mull over her life. So much had changed over the past two weeks though. One specific change met her ears as she heard a set of footsteps walking along the porch, over the threshold of the front door and into her lounge. The sound of heavy boots on the wooden floor stopped after a couple of low paces, and Claire heard Owen call to her from the end of the lounge:

"Are you sure this is your home?" she heard him ask in disbelief, and she kept her eyes on the contents of the fridge, smiling as she imagined the look on his face that matched his tone of voice, "It looks more like a show room." She heard his footsteps on the wooden flooring again, and she continued smiling as their sound echoed around the room next to the kitchen she was in. It was an overwhelmingly pleasant change to the sound of only her heels echoing back at her that she had become so accustomed to. "I mean, where's all your stuff?"

Claire grimaced at the smell again and closed the fridge door gently, choosing to tackle the mouldy fruit later. She slowly made her way to the doorway that stood between the kitchen and lounge, her small heels clipping along the tiled floor. She stopped in the doorway, and she leant against the doorframe, her arms folded as a relaxed smile grew on her face. Owen was stood next to the coffee table and was now furrowing his brow at the front cover of the Jurassic World brochure he had picked up and held in front of his face. They had had a mad couple of weeks, and the past seven days spent on the island had certainly been eventful, but this part of the day, that had once been Claire's least favourite part of the day prior to the fateful escape of the I-Rex, was now her most favourite part of the day. The moment the sun would begin to lower towards the horizon. It was the time in the day that the team on the island would decide to retire for the day as the light was disappearing. Unsurprisingly it was difficult and dangerous to track and catch dinosaurs when it was dark, and nobody denied it. It was around that time in the day that Owen and Claire would get into the abandoned Jurassic World jeep that they had adopted on their first day of their return to the island, and drive to Owen's bungalow.

Claire stepped through the front door of the bungalow for the first time, behind Owen who had strode into the kitchen to turn the light on, and was evidently pleased to be back. She was unsurprised to see that the bungalow contained a lot of possessions, but surprised to see just how tidy it was. All of the items she could see in the small lounge area that connected to the small open-plan kitchen were all items that suited the wooden building she stood in. It made the bungalow immediately feel like a home. And it made Claire smile as she looked from the different cushions on the sofa along the far wall to her left, to the books that rested on a shelf that ran the length of the lounge-kitchen area, to the mugs that hung on hooks that had been drilled onto a section of the kitchen wall. The fridge had a collection of fun dinosaur-themed magnets, and alphabet magnets too. And there was an impressive wine-rack that acted as a dining table/kitchen work surface beside the sink, with two bar stools in the lounge area that sat in front of it. Claire looked over at Owen, who was stood looking at her while he leant against the large fridge in the kitchen, his arms crossed and a small smile across his face. Claire kept whatever expression she had on her face, shaking her head slightly in amazement at the bungalow that she had once been so adamant would be a smelly man-pit (back during her first visit to get him to see the I-Rex the previous week) but it was actually the homeliest home she had set foot in in a very long time.

"So, what do you think?" she heard him ask her, a tinge of uncertainty in his voice, and she smiled.

"I love it!" she said honestly, and she watched Owen beam at her as he stood upright and slowly walked towards her. She was tired. They had had a busy first day on the island, but even with the fatigue she could feel her heart racing in excitement and anticipation as she watched him approach her. Today had been the first day in about a week that they hadn't been in each other's pockets. That they'd been in the same room or vicinity, but had had to keep their hands to themselves. And Claire hadn't realised how often she put her arm around his waist, or brought a hand up to his chest, or leant against his side so he could place his hand in her back pocket and cup her ass. She hadn't realised all this until today. Their first official day back at work, when they lead the team to the island as part of a first response team to capture the loose dinosaurs that roamed the island. She remembered so many moments when she had looked over at him longingly, desperate to just place her arms around him and kiss his lips. She had craved feeling him against her, which had made their car journey from the main hub over to here torturous!

Claire felt her stomach twist with excitement, her breathing increasing as Owen stopped in front of her, his eyes locked with hers. She noticed that he glanced briefly down at her lips, his face having relaxed, and she watched as he took a deep breath, "Can I ask you something?"

Claire froze. Oh god, what was he going to ask her? Not marriage. Claire couldn't handle the idea of a shot-gun proposal. Marriage hadn't ever been on her radar in the past, and while she loved Owen, she didn't think she could accept a marriage proposal from him just now. Mostly because they had only really known each other properly for eight days. Claire didn't count the two interactions they had had prior to the morning she had arrived at this bungalow to take him to see the I-Rex before it got loose.

Wait…did she just admit to herself that she loved him? Owen Grady? The grubby, cocky, stubborn raptor-trainer? The handsome, loving, kind, smart, tidy, calm, protective raptor-trainer? Claire took a sharp intake of breath as he paused, her eyes getting lost in his. Of course she loved him! He made her feel more loved than anybody had ever made her feel before, and ever could again. This was love. Right here. She trusted him with her life, with her heart, and she knew he did too.

"Will you…" oh god, here it is. Claire felt sick. She really didn't want to let him down, but she would have to, there was no way she could agree to marry him. Not yet. Maybe one day, sure. She had plenty of money, and she could only presume he did too, after all they had both worked on the island for a few years now without having much in the way of outgoings. There was nothing left to do but to save their money really. So maybe one day, when the island was more under control, and The Board would let her quit her job, and she could find another job that gave her as much satisfaction and kept her busy but that coincided with whatever job Owen wanted too, then maybe then they could get married. But only then. Not now. "…will you be my girlfriend?"

Claire exhaled. That was definitely not the question she was expecting. Had she really just admitted to herself that she wanted to marry him one day? Owen Grady? The grubby, cocky, stubborn raptor-trainer? The handsome, loving, kind, smart, tidy, calm, protective raptor-trainer? Of course she wanted to marry him one day! But until then, being his girlfriend was definitely enough. And Claire felt a smile spread over her face, tears prickling her eyes without her realising, as she nodded and immediately brought her arms around Owen's neck, pulling him into a deep kiss.

"Yes," she said between kisses, as he wrapped his arms around her waist pulling her tighter towards him, "yes, of course yes." And she could feel him smiling against her lips as their deep kisses intensified. She could feel his thumbs running along the seam of her jeans that were sitting on her waist and she took that as an indication that he was anticipating exactly what she was. But, as always, she was the one to take charge of the situation and she brought her hands down, grabbing the bottom of his grubby white t-shirt and pulling it up. His hands quickly shot in the air as the two reluctantly broke their kiss for a millisecond so Claire could tug his t-shirt over his head, immediately dumping it on the floor before their lips met again, hungrily. Claire's hands ran over Owen's torso that boasted a multitude of cuts and scrapes, the worst of which were now healing nicely. Owen's hands ran from Claire's cheeks, down to her shoulders, his fingers taking hold of the straps of her vest-top, sliding them down her arms. In the meantime Claire had got hold of his jeans, beginning to unbutton them, but Owen quickly pulled away, breaking the kiss. Claire furrowed her brow as Owen looked at her. She had her vest top pulled down so it was scrunched around her waist revealing her bra, and at some point either she or Owen had undone the top button of her jeans. Owen took her hand with a grin, and pulled her with him as he walked backwards past the kitchen, down a small dark corridor, towards a door at the back of the bungalow. But Claire didn't know there was a door there. She was too busy wrapping her arms around Owen's neck again, letting him pull her up so she was now straddling his waist, feeling the bulge in his jeans. They kissed desperately, passionately as Owen backed them into the room, turning, then gently lowering Claire onto his bed.

Claire felt his weight on top of her as she continued to kiss him hungrily, while his hands made light work of her bra. She opened her eyes as she felt him reach out to something behind the head of the bed. Suddenly the room lit up. It was a dim sort of light. But a pretty sort of light. Before Claire resumed kissing she noticed that around the room were hundreds of fairy lights, and she ignored her temptation to furrow her brow at the curiosity of why Owen Grady of all people had fairy lights as a way of lighting up his bedroom, choosing to succumb to how romantic it made the setting

"Penny for your thought, Ms Dearing." Claire snapped back to reality as Owen spoke to her and she realised she had been staring at him. She stepped a couple of steps into the lounge, her heels echoing back at her as they always did, while Owen chucked the brochure back on the coffee table before walking slowly towards her.

"What makes you think that I was thinking anything at all, Mr Grady?" she asked curiously as he stopped before her. That lop-sided grin she loved had appeared on his face, and her heart felt warm as she looked at him. Her boyfriend. If someone had told her two weeks ago that the raptor trainer she found so infuriatingly rude and annoying would become the one person she couldn't imagine her life without, that he would become her boyfriend, perhaps even one day her husband, Claire would have called them crazy. Yet here he was. Here she was. Here they were. Seven days into their time here on the island. Fourteen days straight spent together. Not one argument. Not one bickering moment. Not one heated discussion. Just love. And laughter. And sex. And a lot of flirting.

"You did that thing with your lips." She heard him say, and she furrowed her brow slightly.

"What thing?"

"Your mouth curls into a side-smile on that side." And as Owen pointed affectionately to the right hand side of her mouth Claire let out a laugh. He meant she did her own lop-sided grin, just like he did. But she didn't, did she?

"No I don't!" she said delightfully, gently swatting him with her hand as she brought her arms down to her side.

"You do!" he protested, grinning playfully, "Whenever you're thinking of something while you look at me you smile like that. Like…I dunno…dreamily." And Claire laughed loudly at how absurd he sounded. She didn't look dreamily when she watched him. Her laugh almost echoed back at her and it sounded alien. She had never laughed in this house before. She had actually never felt happy in this house before. Well, not this happy anyway. Claire felt Owen take her hands, a calm smile on his face as he looked at her, "So come on, what thought put that smile on your face?"

Claire paused, biting her bottom lip. She noticed his face was being lit by the sunset that was beginning to seep into the large window to her right. She had never appreciated the sunset outside her house as much as she did this evening. She took a deep breath, looking into the hazel eyes of the man in front of her, who was trying to read her mind, a small smile on his face. "I've never had a guest in the house before. It's only ever been me…"

She saw Owen's expression drop slightly with surprise. She could feel her own expression had dropped. She had never told anyone just how lonely she had been in this house before. She knew her housekeeper probably presumed it. She had never met the woman, having always gone to work too early and returned too late to see or talk to her. The only way she knew she had popped by was by the washed up wine glass next to the kitchen sink and the fresh fruit in the fridge.

"Well now I feel bad…" she heard Owen say, and she panicked. She hadn't revealed her secret to make him feel guilty. If anything she just didn't want to keep secrets from him. "…I should've got you a gift, what with me being your first ever guest." And to her relief, Claire saw him shoot her a cheeky grin. She smiled as he took a potentially depressing conversation and put his own funny spin on it. In true Owen Grady fashion. This was what this house had been missing over the years that she had lived here. Someone to make her smile if she were ever feeling sad, which had often been every time she had come back to this building.

Claire brought her hands up to Owen's cheeks as he placed his hands on her hips, and she brought her face closer to his, hovering her lips over his as she spoke, "You being here is gift enough" and she kissed him softly, like a thank you, as the sun slowly set outside.


	12. The T-Rex & The Raptor

Owen looked down from the walkway that hung securely over the raptor pen. Blue was busy jumping up below him, whining. He felt guilty for having tricked her to stay in the pen. She had taken him by surprise yesterday when he had stopped there on his way from Claire's house to the main hub of the island where the team were staying and had found Blue standing patiently by the gate of the pen. It had been as though she were waiting for him. Wondering where her master had gone. Owen had remained in the car, frozen, wondering what the best next move would be.

Owen looked out of his windscreen, up at the sky, and there he saw a helicopter hovering over the raptor pen. He knew Barry and a handful of their response team were in the process of dropping down into the pen. They were safe in there. It was Blue stood on the outside that he was more concerned about. His concern increased when he saw Claire rolling up in her car, panic etched over her face when she noticed the raptor outside the gate of the pen. All they needed to do was wait for the team, led by Barry, to check the pen was secure so that they could open the gate and tempt Blue inside by chucking some meat in the centre of the pen.

Owen looked over at Claire who was still staring at the raptor. "Look away from her Claire, look away." He found himself muttering over and over under his breath. His stomach lurched as he looked over at his raptor and noticed her slowly edging towards Claire's car curiously. He had never intended to get out and distract the animal. He couldn't guarantee that she still regarded him as her alpha, not after nine weeks away from her. But he would never be able to live with himself if something happened to Claire. They had become a force to be reckoned with over the past couple of months on the island, to the point that Barry, who had arrived on the island with the second recovery team a month ago, had teased Owen, calling him and Claire "Jurassic World's very own power couple". She had quickly become his other half, his partner, and he couldn't imagine having to spend one more day on this planet without her. It was this feeling that gave him the adrenaline to steadily open his jeep door and step out of the vehicle.

He froze, keeping his hands held up at the raptor, who had stopped a couple of feet from Claire's car and turned to look at him. He could feel his breathing begin to increase as he remained his eye contact on the animal. "Blue, stand down." But Blue turned to stand head on with him instead, screeching loudly. He could just see behind the creature the look of terror on Claire's face as she sat in the driver's seat of her car, and watched the raptor slowly creep up to him instead. "Blue, stand down!" Owen yelled a little louder and sterner. But the raptor didn't listen and continued moving slowly towards him, screeching at him again, as though protesting with him, trying to intimidate him. And Owen had to admit, he was beginning to feel a little more intimidated. Had she got taller in the past couple of months that he had been away?

The raptor had almost reached him when suddenly a loud clunk distracted both of their attention, and Owen watched the creature look to her left where the noise had come from. To his relief he heard Barry call Blue's name, and he knew the team had managed to secure the pen and open the gate. The raptor, seeing Barry stood in the middle of the pen holding up a large dead pig, turned and ran for the pen to get to the meat. As she crossed through the open gate and into the area, a hoist quickly tugged Barry up to the walkway above the pen, and he dropped the meat. Blue dived on the flesh of the dead pig that the human had been holding, tucking into it whilst several members of the small team shut the gate of the pen. Owen let out a huge sigh of relief as the men on the bridge and by the gate whooped and cheered, high-fiving and congratulating Barry who laughed, looking shocked at what he had just done. He had put his life on the line to save Owen.

A car door opened to Owen's left and he looked to see Claire staring at him in shock, tears of fear having run down her cheeks as she ran over to him and threw her arms around his neck, her voice sounding muffled as she nestled into the crook of his neck, yelling angrily though he knew she didn't mean to, "Are you crazy? You could have been killed!" he could feel her tears wiping themselves on his skin, as he wrapped his arms around her waist reassuringly, ignoring the looks and nudges from their team, who had turned the moment they had heard Claire yelling at him.

"I'm okay Claire." He answered, and she pulled away from him, giving him a light slap on the chest, her brow furrowed on her tear-stained face, "Yeah but you might not have! She would've torn you to shreds! Then where would that have left me?" Owen wasn't sure how to answer. He was feeling embarrassed. Partly because she was telling him off. And partly because she was telling him off in front of their team. "Don't you ever put your life on the line like that again, okay?" she nagged, her voice still angry, her green eyes shining dangerously at him. He said nothing though, instead he just grinned at her and shrugged. He couldn't promise that he wouldn't do it again, because he would. He would do it again and again and again if it meant that she stayed alive. His response wasn't what she wanted, and she wiped the tears from her cheeks angrily, walking away from him and towards the raptor pen in a huff. Owen still grinned. He had a feeling this was how she reacted when she didn't get her own way. He knew that with a bit of time she would cool off. She may even apologise, but he wasn't holding his breath, it wasn't in her nature to apologise, and he was okay with that. He knew she had only yelled at him because she had been scared. He looked up at the bridge and noticed Barry was laughing at what he had just witnessed between the couple. He threw a thumbs up at Owen, who simply shook his head slightly with a chuckle and wandered over to the raptor pen behind Claire. She refused to talk to him directly for over an hour.

"I thought I'd find you here." He heard a voice say to his right, and he heard her heels slowly clicking on the metal base of the walkway towards him. He glanced at her with a brief grin of 'hello' before turning back to the raptor with concern. "Still no luck with her obeying orders?" Owen shook his head, feeling Claire smooth her arm across the small of his back, and he brought his right arm behind her, stuffing his grubby hand into her back pocket. It had become second nature for them to stand like that when they were alone. He noticed out of the corner of his eye that she had brought her right hand down to take hold of the railing that ran alongside the walkway as she looked down at the raptor. Her hand was filthy, her once meticulously manicured fingernails now chipped and dirty.  
Four days before the recapture of Blue they had recaptured their biggest challenge, the T-Rex. It had taken two recovery teams and weeks of planning to organise the best way to tempt the Rex back to its pen. Claire had suggested they used a flare, knowing it had worked the last time she had guided the animal away from its comforts and over to somewhere new. Owen had been reluctant, but the teams had felt it was the only option. As far as they were aware the T-Rex was now weak, with a limited amount of food remaining on the island for her to eat, and as such she would likely be slower than she had been before. Owen had insisted he drive the jeep whilst Claire hung herself out of the window beside him, holding the flare up so the dinosaur could see it. Nobody else in the team had the balls to do it. They had men hidden either side along the way ready with high-powered rockets to kill the beast if it got too close to the couple. But they had out-driven it. Just. The T-Rex had been recaptured. And Claire had taken it upon herself to keep a special eye on the dinosaur.

Owen got it. She hadn't said anything to him about it but he got it. She felt like she had a connection with the T-Rex. It could never ever be on the scale of the connection he had had with his raptors, but he could tell she felt protective of the most dangerous predator alive in the world right now. And he knew that nobody could ever understand why, except perhaps for him. If it hadn't been for that T-Rex both of them and Claire's nephews would have died. She had unknowingly saved their lives. And Claire would be forever grateful to her for that, just like Owen was forever grateful to Claire for having the idea to lure the T-Rex in the I-Rex's direction in the first place.

"How's the T-Rex getting on?" he watched as her expression wavered, and she continued staring at Blue, who was starting to get restless and was now running around in a small circle whilst looking up at them.

"She's still not eating." Claire looked concerned and her tone matched her expression, "I'm worried she might be sick but it's hard to say because I don't really know what she was like before."

Owen gave her a small squeeze and she looked up at him, "Everything's going to be okay." He said, a reassuring smile on his face as he continued, "She's been used to roaming free, out in the wild for two months. It's no surprise that it's taking her a while to adjust." He watched as his girlfriend forced a small smile on her face though he could tell it hadn't eradicated her concerns. It was odd for them to no longer be spending the daytimes together. Since the capture of the T-Rex Claire had spent a lot of her daytime at the T-Rex's pen, which was based in the main hub of the park, having been the park's main attraction back in the day. Owen had spent his time travelling out to other sections of the park with a small team in tow to try to track Blue down, feeling certain that now the main predator on the island was captured she would no longer be afraid to go out and hunt. He'd found her, recaptured her, and now he was spending his daytimes trying to regain her trust. He and Claire had essentially made his bungalow their home, the place that they went back to around dusk. And while that was a great location for the main hub of the park, and as a result Claire's area of work with the T-Rex, it was a good extra forty minutes onto Owen's commute over to the raptor pen. So they had begun using Claire's house as a home for the past couple of days since Blue's capture. Claire insisted she didn't mind the extra time it took to drive, and he believed her. It didn't stop him missing her when she had to leave him in the morning though.

"It's nearly dusk." He said, looking over at the sun that was busy setting in the distance behind them, "We should go." He turned her around, taking her grubby hand in his grubby hand, and walking her in the direction she had come. She didn't object and he knew it was because she was tired and loved being with him, feeling him wrap himself around her, even if it was just with his hand around hers right now. "I finally got one of the boys to bring over some food so we'll actually have something to eat tonight."

With that news he saw Claire's face light up. It had been a big disappointment when they had arrived at her house yesterday evening, the first time they had returned to the house in weeks, and Owen had opened the fridge to find a bowl of mouldy fruit that she had later confessed she had forgotten to throw out when she had first seen it several weeks back. Owen remembered gagging as he had grabbed the bowl, raced out of the back door of the house, down the length of the back lawn, down the small steep wooden steps, and landing on the soft sand of the private cove belonging to the residents of the tiny village. He had thrown the bowl as far away into the ocean as he could, and prayed he never saw nor smelt anything like that again. He remembered looking behind him, and at the top of the steep wooden steps Claire had been looking down at him, her guilty expression spread across her face despite the giggle she was letting out. If he didn't love her so much he would've yelled at how irresponsible she had been to leave that food in that state in her fridge.

Owen could hear her heels clicking on the metal bridge and he had to hand it to her, her insistence on wearing heels to work no matter the environment was impressive. But it was like she had said when they had first packed to return to the island, she had already ran for miles in a forest in heels, nothing could be more difficult than that. And she was probably right. So every morning she put on a pair of heels, that somehow suited her jeans or cargo pants that she wore with a vest-top, and while their team of males had originally rolled their eyes about how impractical her attire seemed for this environment, she had persevered. And they had been surprised at just how active and head-strong she actually was. Owen watched as she gave him a quick peck on the cheek before leading the way with a smile, down the metal stairs that ended outside the pen. He couldn't be prouder to be her boyfriend.


	13. The Alpha & The Unusual Behaviour

The Board had decided months ago that they wanted to re-open the park again now that the assets that had once been out of containment were contained and adjusting to their containment, much to the shock of Claire, Owen and their teams on the island. The main difference to the re-opened park was that there were to be no carnivores as the live attractions. Only herbivores. Since the decision, which was kept private from the public until the time was right, flocks of construction teams had moved onto the island to re-invent the park to make it user-friendly again. The island was beginning to feel functional again, and Owen had been impressed at how quickly construction had been completed. Claire had kept him up to date with the hub of the island's progress, showing him photos on her iPad while they had dinner each evening. The restaurants and shopping area had been re-built. The information centre had been updated. The medical centre had brand new equipment. Clearly the Board were sparing no expense, desperate to make Mirani's vision of an education attraction a new, less dangerous reality, and make back the stock they lost when the park had crashed. Owen rarely went down to the hub of the island. He spent most of his days hidden away with his last remaining raptor. His evenings he spent at home with Claire. Her home was now his home and his home hers. Not that they didn't visit his bungalow from time-to-time, but it was more convenient for him to be at the house nearer to the raptor paddock.

With the influx of construction teams and managers onto the island came the high level of responsibility lumbered onto Claire, who still held the position of Park Manager, having essentially replaced Misrani when he had died. She was in charge of the whole island. But even with this responsibility she still came home at dusk most nights. And it was this routine that always encouraged Owen to leave Blue in good time, and get back to the house to cook Claire dinner. She fortunately left him to do whatever he needed to do to retrain his raptor, having not visited the paddock in a couple of months, trusting that everything he was doing was safe and in everyone's best interest. She had fought with The Board enough about keeping the raptor on the island, even threatening to quit at one point, to which the Board of Directors quickly told her that the raptor would be kept alive as long as it remained in its pen, no matter how well trained it got. That had been enough of a result for Claire and Owen, the park's power couple.

Owen watched as Blue looked over his shoulder to the gate behind him. He refused to take his eyes off her, for fear that she may attack him. Not that she had attempted to attack anybody since being recaptured. But it wasn't worth the risk. He watched her eyes as she appeared to be following something. Someone. Walking from the gate, alongside the pen, and up the steps. He could hear the distinctive sound of his girlfriend's heels clipping up the metal surface, but he still kept his eyes on the raptor, who kept her eyes on the woman walking slowly across the footbridge that hung over the paddock. Owen furrowed his brow. Blue never took any notice of anybody on that footbridge while he was in the paddock with her. Barry had been on that footbridge for an hour while Owen had been talking to and interacting with the raptor, and the animal hadn't once looked up at him. But Blue didn't tear her eyes from Claire as she stopped beside Barry on the bridge.

"Owen what's going on?" he heard Barry calling down at him, clearly noticing that something wasn't quite right either. Owen dared to steal a glance up at Claire and Barry who stood up on the footbridge, leaning over to look at the raptor and trainer below.

"I've no idea. She's never done this before." Owen found himself saying. The raptor hadn't flinched when he spoke, she had maintained her eyes on Claire who seemed to be feeling a bit confused.

"She's never done what before?" He heard her call down to him. As she spoke Owen noticed that Blue had moved a couple of steps closer to the bridge, as though Claire had spoken to her instead.

"She's never noticed anybody else while I'm in the paddock with her." Owen replied. He would've felt silly for saying something so big-headed if he hadn't been in so much shock. He heard Barry suggest that perhaps it was the sound of Claire's heels but that didn't make sense. It was as though Blue had noticed that the woman had arrived before she had. "Can't be," he said, shaking his head as he kept his eyes on the raptor. No reaction from the animal whatsoever. "She saw Claire at the gate, but couldn't hear her heels."

Owen noticed the raptor had begun moving her head to her right, as though watching someone walking across the bridge, but he couldn't hear his girlfriend's heels, so it couldn't be her. As Blue looked to her far right he took the opportunity to follow the raptor's gaze and to his surprise he saw Claire stop at the far end of the bridge, her heels in her hands, her bare feet on the cool metal, as she looked down at the raptor in confusion. Her voice sounded concerned, "Definitely not the heels." She began walking back to the centre of the bridge where Barry stood, looking at her in surprise while the raptor followed her movement curiously. "Why is she looking at me?" Owen heard Claire ask, and he shook his head, shrugging. He had no idea.

Claire was beginning to feel a little scared as she looked down at the large raptor who couldn't take her eyes off her. If this was unusual behaviour for Blue then she wanted Owen to get out of the paddock as soon as possible. She would feel happier if he were safely on the other side of the gate. But she couldn't catch his eye as he looked at Blue in confusion.

"Owen I think you should get out of there mate." She heard Barry call down to him, and she felt relieved when her boyfriend nodded before slowly backing towards the gate. The raptor didn't notice, she was too busy looking up at Claire who now stood rather uneasily on the bridge as she tried to get her heels back on without making too many sudden movements. Claire didn't want to look over at Owen, for fear that the raptor would follow her gaze, but she heard Barry walk away towards the metal steps that lead down to the gate of the pen. Claire took it upon herself to slowly walk back to the far end of the bridge where she had walked to before and to her relief the raptor had begun to walk with her, cocking her head curiously. The woman heard a clunk of the paddock's gate and let out a huge sigh of relief as she knew that sound meant Owen had made it out safely.

Sure enough, two moments later she saw him appear at the other end of the bridge, pacing over to her. His brow was furrowed and she looked at him, confused as he approached her curiously. "What?" she heard herself asking, watching Barry also approach them. But the men simply looked at each other then back at her. Claire was beginning to feel a bit self-conscious and placed her hands on her hips, changing her facial expression so it was a little more no-nonsense, "What?" she asked again more persistently. It was enough for Owen to answer her, a curious smile now on his face:

"Blue's looking at you like you're an alpha." She heard him say, and she snorted, rolling her eyes in disbelief. But the men stood in front of her didn't laugh, they were serious.

"How on earth can I be an alpha if I haven't visited this paddock in weeks?" she asked. She had been dying to spend a day with Owen at work to see the progress he had been making with his raptor. He had of course told her all about it over dinners, but she was yet to see it for herself. Well, until today. She had been so impressed to see him actually in the paddock with Blue, if not a bit scared for his safety. "I've never been in the paddock with her. I've never fed her. I've never placed a finger on her. I can't be an alpha." She said matter of factly, shaking her head slightly. The men furrowed their brow as all three adults turned to look back down at the raptor curiously.

"Well something about you has caught her attention." Barry said thoughtfully. His cell rang and he answered it, waving a farewell to the couple on the bridge, before walking away and down the steps.

Claire looked down at the raptor, "I could smell like the T-Rex?" but Owen shook his head, telling her that couldn't be it. How could they explain all the other times she had visited the paddock after spending the day taking care of the T-Rex? And it wasn't like Claire was cuddled up with the T-Rex every day. She never touched it. Blue hadn't once took any notice of Claire after her return from the T-Rex's paddock before. Even with heels on. Even when she greeted Owen, wrapping her arms around him, the raptor's alpha... Alpha. Claire turned to Owen, snaking her arm around his lower back as he brought his left hand down into her back pocket.

"What is the likelihood of the T-Rex ever having an alpha?" she asked curiously. She heard her boyfriend let out a chuckle, shaking his head slightly as he looked down at her, "Not a chance. She's the queen of the natural food chain. Why?" And Claire turned back to the raptor who was standing as straight as possible to get a better look of her, her head cocked curiously again as she watched the woman up on the bridge. She knew another dinosaur that looked at her in that way. Her dinosaur.

Claire strode down the corridor and into the control room of the raptor paddock, the morning team greeting her. She chucked her jacket on the back of one of her team's chairs, picked up a walkie-talkie, and made her way through a door with two other people. She apologised for being late, having never been late for anything in her life before today, glancing at her watch as she walked down another small corridor. 8.34 am. Almost fifteen minutes late. Unheard of for the impeccably prompt Claire Dearing. Well with the exception of two weeks ago when she had treated herself to an extra hour in bed.

The two people who had begun walking with her peeled off through a door and Claire arrived at a steep spiral staircase. She began climbing them quickly, feeling dizzy as the stairs kept spiralling. Once she reached the top there was another door. Before reaching out to it she opened a small box, pulled out a flare, then stepped through the door. The warm humid air of Isla Nublar hit her nostrils, and she walked out onto a small platform of a very tall tower that stood beside the feeding area in the T-Rex's paddock. Claire heard her walkie-talkie sound, the team asking her if she was ready. She took a deep breath before replying that she was, and she heard the loud clunk of a gate opening, a sign that the T-Rex was being let into the feeding section of the paddock. Claire looked out to the trees in anticipation. This had fast become one of her favourite perks of the job. She saw the trees begin to part, and so she lit the flare in her hand. The T-Rex appeared, and noticed the flare that Claire was now waving in the air. The dinosaur approached her quickly, and once the Rex was mid-pace, Claire took another deep breath and flung the flare with all her might towards the meat that waited for the T-Rex below. The dinosaur followed the flare to the food, and Claire took the opportunity to race down the spiral staircase. She crossed the corridor she had come from and made her way through a door and into the viewing gallery, where visitors had once stood and watched the feeding segments at Jurassic World, safely from behind the tall reinforced glass. Now she and her T-Rex team were the only people in the world with that privilege.

As Claire moved up to the glass she froze. She always froze, every time the T-Rex took a break from eating to turn and look at her. It started happening a couple of weeks ago, the first time Claire had thrown the flare (the previous flare-thrower had quit due to a fear of heights. And dinosaurs.) The T-Rex didn't stop eating for anybody but Claire, and she saw it as a privilege. She now came down to the paddock during feeding time every day to throw the flare, then take the opportunity to connect with her dinosaur. There, she said it, her dinosaur.

Claire hesitated, her heart racing. Today was different. Instead of just looking, the T-Rex stood up and moved over to her, the ground shaking with each step. The dinosaur stopped, staring straight at her. Claire felt almost certain the creature cocked its head to the side curiously, as though it was looking into her soul. If she hadn't been so stunned by the T-Rex's behaviour she would've heard the whispering and gathering of her team far behind her at the back of the viewing area, all confused as to why the dinosaur was acting in that way. With a deep breath Claire brought her right hand up to the glass, placing her hand flat on the surface, and to her shock the T-Rex placed her muzzle gently against the glass on the other side. This was the closest she was ever going to get to touching her T-Rex. Claire broke her stare as the sound of her cell chirped loudly, echoing around the area. The glass fogged up briefly as the dinosaur snorted quickly, before pulling her muzzle back. She continued to stare at Claire and Claire at her, until the woman took it upon herself to slowly leave the viewing area to answer her phone that was clearly disturbing her dinosaur. As she walked she heard her heels echoing around her as her team remained in a stunned silence as the T-Rex followed Claire's movements with her gaze.

"And that was this morning?" she heard Owen ask, clearly struggling to make sense of what she had just told him. Claire nodded, and watched her boyfriend pause as he looked at her with a furrowed brow. "How long has this been going on for?" she heard him ask.

"About two weeks. But she's never come up to me before, not like that." She saw Owen raise his eyebrows and she had a feeling he was having a hard time believing her. "You don't believe me." She said, her tone having a tinge of hurt to it, the kind that made Owen pull her tighter to him.

"I believe you Claire, I'm just struggling to picture a T-Rex coming up to you and giving your hand a nudge with its nose…" When he put it like that Claire could understand how the story sounded implausible. "I guess I'll just have to show you then." Claire replied, removing her arm from around his waist, taking his hand from her back pocket, and leading him across the bridge to the steps. The raptor followed the woman's movements intently, across the bridge, down the steps, past the paddock, and out of sight as the couple got into Claire's car.


	14. The Pavilion & Two Hands

Owen was impressed with the progress the reconstruction teams had made with the park down by the main hub. The island was beginning to look like it had never put thousands of people in danger just over a year ago. A year ago. He had been rounding up their time here on the island to 'a year' for weeks and now it was finally true. Though he hadn't done it because he couldn't remember the exact date. He knew. How could he forget? And it was because of one particular person who was leading him through the control room of the T-Rex paddock.

Owen dashed into the kitchen from the back door the second he had heard her car pull up to the front of the house, brushing down his front nervously. Excitably. He had made a big effort for this, their one year anniversary. He heard her pushing through the front door, her heels clicking on the wooden floor of the lounge as she stepped into the house. He heard her call out his name almost like it was a question on her lips, wondering if he was already here. He normally was. But whenever he was home before her he usually had his music blasting from somewhere in the house which would always bring a smile to her face. Not this evening. This evening the house was quiet.

Owen stepped to the door of the kitchen that led into the lounge and he notice her face light up when she saw him. The sight of her took his breath away. Her red hair had become long over the months they had been on the island, cascading down over her shoulders and ending in line with her navel. She hadn't had it cut as there had been no access to a hairdresser to maintain the sharp bob she had once had when she had got her promotion to Senior Park Coordination and Assets Manager three years ago. And no matter how brave Owen was, he couldn't trust himself with taking a pair of scissors to that delicate hair, no matter how many times Claire had insisted she trusted him. So she had had to pull it back into a loose bun at work, and let it flow to its natural length when she got home. Tonight, however, she seemed to have styled it so odd locks were loosely curled, the rest straight. She had tied the left side back with a green and silver clip. And she appeared to have got changed at work as she wasn't wearing the strappy blue top and jeans that she had left the house in that morning. Now she was stood in front of him in the figure-hugging green dress that she had worn on their fateful first date. Owen knew his mouth was open as he stared at her, but he didn't care. Nor did she it seemed, as the woman simply let out a chuckle whilst slowly walking towards him, a flirtatious grin on her face.

"Don't you think you're jinxing tonight a bit by wearing that dress?" he found himself asking, his mouth forming an equally flirtatious grin as he heard Claire's heels echoing around the silent room.

"Well you're not in board shorts so we're already on to a winner…" Claire said, and Owen couldn't help the small laugh he let out. She was right, he wasn't in board shorts. He had spent the past month planning this evening, knowing that it was the first anniversary Claire had ever had, and he wanted to make it the best anniversary possible. So he had taken the rare ferry across to Costa Rica, the one strictly for island personnel, gone to a tailor, and had been measured for a nice pair of pants and a decent shirt. He'd even bought a tie to go with it. And it definitely hadn't gone unnoticed as he watched Claire stop in front of him, look him up and down with a smile on her face, reach out, and take his tie in her hand. He noticed her feel the fabric between her finger and thumb, before looking up into his eyes. He held his breath in anticipation. Anticipation of what she might say. Anticipation of what she might do.

"You've got a suit." She said, her voice sounding delighted despite how much she seemed to try to be flirtatious.

"I got a suit." Owen said proudly, mirroring her grin, and he felt her tug the tie gently towards her. He brought his face down to hers and kissed her lightly on the lips. He could feel her smiling against his lips and he knew how important this was to her. Owen stopped kissing for a moment, pulling away ever so slightly, his nose still rubbing against the tip of Claire's affectionately as he looked into her eyes, "Happy Anniversary" he whispered, and he felt her let out a little content sigh as she replied with the same whisper "Happy Anniversary". He brought his lips back to hers, and their kiss was intense, the couple wrapping their arms around each other as they became like one person.

The buzz of the egg timer in the kitchen went off behind him, and Owen quickly broke the kiss, looking at Claire as she squinted her eyes curiously, wondering why the timer had gone off. Owen grinned at her, his heart racing with excitement as he realised the next part of the evening was ready. "I've got something to show you" And he pulled her towards the kitchen, leading her through to the back door. "Close your eyes." He said eagerly, and he looked back to see that she had done what she was told, though furrowing her brow with intrigue.

Owen stepped outside to the back porch, and he knew the moment Claire would too she would know something was different with the garden. He looked at her face drop in shock as her heels landed on the wooden porch at the back of the house, and he told her to open her eyes. His heart was in his mouth, hoping she would like what she was about to see. And he saw Claire's face light up as she gazed in wonder at their back garden. Owen had spent the last month coming back to the house between feeding and training time with Blue to redesign the garden. He had built a decked area at the back of the house which boasted a large Jacuzzi on their left that he had built and fitted himself, though the parts he had had to get delivered to the island. Where once the garden had just been a long stretch of lawn from the back of the house to the large trees at the bottom of the property's land, there was now raised beds either side of the lawn with a gorgeous variety of flowers and plants. And in the centre of the lawn there was a small round pavilion, with a small table in the middle, and two chairs around it. On the table were two wine glasses, two plates, and two sets of cutlery . Beside the pavilion was a large barbeque that was currently smoking away. A path was apparent thanks to the small lanterns that lead from the decking to the pavilion, though the sun was still in the sky, so they were not lit. Owen saw Claire turn to him,

"When did you…?"

"A little bit every day for the past few weeks." He answered, grinning at her as her eyes watered at him. He hadn't seen a smile on her face that wide in a few months, and it filled him with joy that he provided that happiness. All the hours and planning he had put into this garden, it had all been for her, it had been done with her in mind. If they were going to make this there home. Their real home. Then it would need to feel like a home from the outside in.

"How did you do it without me noticing?" she asked in amazement, looking longingly over at the Jacuzzi, then back to him again.

"You always come home at dusk. And the first thing you do when you come back, before dinner, is have a shower, or lay down on the sofa to read your book, or we go upstairs and…" before he finished his sentence the woman before him laughed out loud. He loved it when she came home. Their days at work had been a little emptier now they saw less of each other. So the second she came through the door each night it took him all of his self-control not to immediately pounce on her, to let her wrap her arms around his neck and kiss him passionately while he carried her up to their bedroom or over to the sofa. Even one year on he still eagerly awaited her return, like an excitable puppy dog. And the way she normally jumped on him made him feel like she probably felt the same. "You've never thought to look out into the back garden right?" and he grinned as Claire shook her head gently, her smile not wiping off her face. She'd mentioned, around the second or third night they had stayed in this house, a couple of days after they had recaptured Blue, that she hated the back garden. She hated that it was just a long patch of grass. There was no character to it. It didn't feel like a proper garden, and having a proper garden would make the house feel more like a home. So Owen had made a promise to himself to do up the garden for her. It wouldn't be any time soon, but some time in the next year. And he had kept his promise to himself. And now they stood on the decking of their back garden, both with broad smiles on their faces. "So the timer was to tell me that our dinner is ready."

Owen held his arm out in front of them, motioning to the pavilion in the middle of the huge garden, and Claire led the way with a small giggle, clicking her heels down the wooden steps and down to the lawn. She paused once her feet hit the grass, her heels sinking into the lush green ground below them, and she pulled her heels off her feet, hanging them from two of her fingers on her left hand before taking Owen's arm with her right, and Owen couldn't take his eyes off her as he escorted her over to the pavilion.

It had been about 18 days since then and actually the couple had spent more of their time in the evenings out on that pavilion or in that Jacuzzi now than in their house, looking up at the stars, sharing funny or interesting stories from their childhoods and work and how they had come to this moment together. Owen supposed that was the thing about meeting 'The One' in your thirties. He had lived so much of his life without Claire and she without him that they had plenty of new stories and memories to share with each other almost all the time.

Owen followed Claire through a door at the back of the T-Rex's control room. One of her team members greeted her as 'The Rex Whisperer' to which he had heard her giggle at. But it had been a forced giggle. He could tell she was nervous. Heck, he was nervous. What if everything she had told him happened again? What would that mean? Had she actually become the T-Rex's alpha? If so, how? She hadn't been on the island when the dinosaur had hatched, so it wasn't like she had imprinted on the T-Rex. And yeah she had taken it upon herself to spend every day at the T-Rex's paddock, but there was no way that would be enough for the notoriously temperamental animal to see her as an alpha.

Claire opened another door marked 'Viewing Tunnel' and Owen followed her, looking in awe at the size of the long tunnel-esque building that reminded him of the underwater tunnels some aquariums and sea life centers had, with the walls shaped with curved glass. How had the visitors of the old park not been like sitting ducks when viewing the T-Rex feeding times?

"So I came along and stopped right here." Claire described, stopping by the glass halfway down the tunnel. Owen followed her, looking out of the window, trying to see what she was looking for. There was nothing out there but large plants thickly clumped together and an opening on the ground out in front of the couple which, by the blood stains on the leafy floor and black smoked-out old flares, was presumably where the dinosaur ate. "Obviously she only comes over to this section when it's her meal time."

"Is she locked in a different part of the paddock out of mealtime hours?" Owen asked, still peering out of the window. If she was then he would stop looking for her right away.

"No. The plan was to originally do that for each mealtime, but because she hadn't been eating well with that routine we decided to only separate her from this section overnight, so that the night team can do safety checks of this viewing area. We don't want her to be able to get in." Owen nodded in agreement, looking around him at the area. It was an impressive piece of engineering and he could tell the glass was reinforced. Suddenly he began to hear heavy footsteps starting off very quietly, but soon becoming louder, and the floor of the viewing area began to shake. Owen looked over at Claire, expecting her to be afraid, but she seemed calm, as though she had expected or at least hoped that the creature belonging to those footsteps would join them.

Owen looked out of the glass window to see the trees parting and revealing the T-Rex, who stopped several feet in front of them, blinking as she looked at the couple inside the viewing area. Owen couldn't be sure but it looked as though the T-Rex had cocked her head slightly, much like the raptor had. He had never seen a T-Rex do that. Particularly as their heads were so large. The T-Rex kept her eyes on them…or…was she just keeping her eyes on Claire? Owen looked to his left at his girlfriend who took a step closer to the glass with a deep breath. To his amazement the T-Rex did the same, except it only took the dinosaur two steps to reach the glass. The animal didn't roar, or screech, or make any noise. She just stood, almost patiently, as though waiting for Claire to do something. Owen watched his girlfriend slowly bring her hand up, and place it flat against the glass, just as she had described to him earlier. He held his breath. This was it. But after a few moments the Rex didn't move her nose to the glass, instead choosing to look down Claire's body from her hand on the glass to her feet. The heels. Did the dinosaur remember the sound of the woman's heels?

"I don't understand." Owen heard Claire say nervously, "She didn't do this earlier, I swear. She really did nuzzle my hand."

Owen smoothed his hand across her lower back to reassure her, "I believe you" but before he could continue the dinosaur stood up straight the moment Owen had moved. It was as though she hadn't even noticed he was there. Owen knew better than to annoy a dinosaur, if that really was what he had done, and he brought his hand back to his side, taking two steps back from Claire. This seemed to calm the animal again, who had cocked her head, looking at the red head.

Owen watched his girlfriend take a deep breath, turn to her left, and slowly walk down the viewing tunnel, ensuring she looked at the dinosaur the whole time while the sound of her heels echoed all around them. Owen's jaw dropped as, just like she had said, the dinosaur began to follow her. It was as though there was some unspoken connection between them, and if Owen hadn't been so shocked her would've furrowed his brow and tried to make more sense of it. After several paces Claire turned and walked back, standing just to the left of Owen again, the dinosaur having followed her.

The T-Rex now stood in a clearing in front of them, her eyes still on Claire. Claire's mouth was open with surprise, a small smile creeping from the corners, and Owen watched as his girlfriend slowly stepped up to the glass once again. This time she placed both hands up on the glass window and the dinosaur stepped forward. Owen's heart lurched in fear as the T-Rex leant her nose gently against the glass, as though imagining Claire was stoking either side of her scaly nostrils. Owen stared in marvel at not only Claire's confidence with the enormous creature, but also at how gentle the Rex seemed to be towards Claire, as though it were worried it would hurt her. Even though the T-Rex's nose wasn't necessarily just on the glass where Claire's hands were, it being so big that it essentially covered the whole of her body from her thighs to her chest, Owen was entranced by the whole spectacle. What did this mean? Was Claire right? Was she becoming the T-Rex's alpha? And he remained still as he watched his girlfriend somehow connecting with the world's most dangerous predator. The Tyrannosaurus Rex. Her Tyrannosaurus Rex.


	15. The Board & The Kit

Claire got out of her car, shutting the door behind her and walking up the path to her house. She tugged at the corners of the jacket of her white suit, her spotless white heels clicking as she walked up the wooden steps of the front porch. She had become so unaccustomed to wearing formal attire like this in the year that they had been on this island, that she felt uncomfortable. But she had had to wear it. She had pulled out an old outfit she had always worn back in the day, chucked it on, been satisfied that it had fit her, and then driven to the hub of the park. There she walked into a large room that was filled with the world's press, and announced to them all, and their service users, that Jurassic World would be opening its gates once again to the public in the summer. This had of course sparked a scramble of hands and microphones as news reporters and journalists desperately asked heated questions about the decision to reopen, about what would be different, if free life-time passes would be offered to the survivors of the original park – those that dared to return anyway.

Claire was in the room with them for two hours. She then took members of The Board on a tour around the park, showing them the reconstruction of the shops, tourist information point, and took them to see all the herbivores that had survived the first park. The Board had been keen to see Blue too, but she had explained that it was too far away for them to fit in a visit today, though her real reason was that she didn't want to let them meet Owen. It was no secret that the two of them had managed to escape the island together the first time around, the CCTV footage from the carnage had proved that, but she hadn't exactly told her bosses that she was now in a relationship with the raptor trainer. Not because she was ashamed, but more because she wouldn't be able to let Owen get away with hiding out in the raptor paddock spending all day every day with Blue. She would have to manage him. And she didn't want to do that. He was her partner. Her other half. And though they worked for the same institution, and yes technically she was his boss because she was everyone's boss here on this island, she didn't want to have to tell him what to do.

Claire had also initially planned to avoid taking them to see the T-Rex, but when one of the coffee shop staff foolishly asked them if they had seen it yet, they immediately demanded they did. Claire had tentatively invited them into the visitor's tunnel, shooting daggers at the T-Rex team stood at the back of the tunnel, in case they dared mention that she was now nicknamed 'The Rex Whisperer'. The Board members had marvelled at the size of the dinosaur when she had appeared, none of them having ever visited Jurassic World back when it had originally been open. For a while visit by the men had gone well. The T-Rex had stood almost obediently opposite Claire and she dared not move for fear her bosses would notice just how attached the dinosaur appeared to be to her. It had all been going so well, until after ten minutes the quietest member of The Board, Marcus Johnson, mentioned that the T-Rex hadn't stopped looking at her since it had arrived. Claire had somehow come up with a line about how the team here didn't usually wear so much white and the men had laughed at the reference to her fashion choice that day. After fifteen minutes, once The Board had seemed satisfied that they'd seen enough of the T-Rex (who had really done nothing but stand and stare) they decided they wanted to leave and catch the final ferry back to Costa Rica before dusk fell. They waited for Claire to lead the way and the moment she moved, the T-Rex moved too. She continued walking, desperate to leave before the men made any connections, but the group had stopped, so she stopped, and as a result the T-Rex then stopped. The men looked at her, stunned, and she fobbed them off with another reminder of her white clothing, before walking out of the tunnel completely. She had waited a whole twenty minutes until they left the tunnel behind her. The last thing they said to her as she left them at the docks was that they would be in touch. That didn't sound good.

Claire walked through the front door of her house with a sigh. It was still dusk, but the latter end of dusk. She heard music blasting from the kitchen and she let a relieved smile spread across her face as she heard Owen try to rap along to "Can't Hold Us" by Macklemore. He just about got every fifth or sixth word correct. Every time. Her smile grew as she stepped further into the house, her heels echoing around the lounge that now was filled with both of their possessions. Almost a year on from when they had officially moved in and it finally felt like a proper home. She blinked sleepily as Owen poked his head around the kitchen door at her eagerly, and her smile grew as he shot her a wink. "Heard the press conference on the radio," he said, referring to the radio that he had in the office beside the raptor paddock, "you sounded brilliant." Claire shook her head slightly, her expression dropping a bit. They had really grilled her. "I mean it, you were…I mean everything you said was said with confidence, you knew all your facts, and you said them honestly. That's all that matters." He had begun to walk out of the kitchen towards her, an attractive red stain down his front that Claire could only hope was tomato juice from the Spaghetti Bolognese she could smell cooking in the kitchen. He always made the best Spaghetti Bolognese. He had a reassuring grin on his face and it made her feel calm. She had so much on her mind at the moment, so much to juggle, so much responsibility…yet the way he wrapped his arms around her, the way those hazel eyes bore into her green eyes, she immediately felt relaxed.

"We had to go to the T-Rex paddock." She admitted, and she felt his arms loosen a little around her while he looked at her concerned.

"And…?" She knew why he was concerned. It was exactly why she had been concerned taking The Board members in the visitor's tunnel in the first place. It was three weeks ago that she had taken Owen to the paddock to see how the T-Rex interacted with her. He had been shocked, stunned, in awe of the connection she seemed to have with the dinosaur. And to be fair, she had been pretty stunned too. Since then Owen had been travelling down to watch the Rex's feeding times, to see if the interaction was consistent, and it was. He had even tried to throw the flare himself to see if it had any effect on who the dinosaur interacted with, but it didn't. The T-Rex still chose to stare at Claire. And Claire had started to feel more protective of her dinosaur as the days rolled by, to the point that when The Board had spent the extra twenty minutes in the tunnel without her, she almost stormed in there and chucked them out.

"It went well…until she started following me as I left." She heard Owen groan in frustration at the dinosaur, to which Claire quickly defended the animal, "Hey it's not her fault - she doesn't know the difference between the people who go in that tunnel."

"But she definitely knows you Claire." She heard him say, and she nodded with a sad smile. They just couldn't work out why the dinosaur singled her out every time. Perhaps if she didn't go to the paddock for a couple of days? Perhaps then her T-Rex wouldn't be so attached to her. But if she didn't go, would the dinosaur eat?

"Why don't you go have a shower? Unwind a bit, get out of those clothes…" he said with a kind smile. Claire looked up at him gratefully. She did want to get out of these clothes. She had felt stiff all day, freaking out any time she feared she had creased her jacket. She hadn't had to worry about that in a long time.

"Yeah, I could do with throwing on some sweatpants and a baggy t-shirt." She said wishfully, her mind already on the second draw down of their chest of draws up in their bedroom, where Owen kept his sweatpants.

"You mean my sweatpants and baggy t-shirt?" he asked with a wide smile, and she let out a giggle as she nodded. He always made a point of reminding her that they were his sweatpants and t-shirt or hoodie that she always wore each night, but she knew he loved seeing her petit frame drowning underneath the baggy fabric. She could always tell by the way he looked at her, and the way he smiled. As though he were proud.

Claire felt Owen pull her tighter to him, and he kissed her twice quickly on the lips while a sizzling noise sounded from the kitchen, as though the spaghetti water was boiling over onto the hob. She smiled as she watched him dash back to the kitchen. She slid her heels off her feet, wiggling her toes a little as they cooled on the wooden floor of the lounge, and she pulled the clips, hair-donut, and hair bobble out of her hair, letting her long red locks fall down her back at last. Claire started to make her way to the staircase, with every intention of having the shower that Owen suggested when her boyfriend called out to her from the kitchen, "Oh, the mail came today too. You've got a parcel. Looks like it may be another book or something…" then he broke out into song when the chorus for N'Sync's "Pop" began. Claire furrowed her brow. She couldn't remember ordering a book. She shrugged her jacket off and walked towards the staircase where they always left the unread mail, placing her jacket on the banister. Her heart lurched as she picked up the small package with her name printed on it. It was relatively light. She knew exactly what it was.

"How long until dinner?" she called to Owen, and he responded with a better time than she had expected, "About fifteen minutes" he called back to her. She told him she was going to have a shower, presuming he had heard, despite the music now blasting around the kitchen, and made her way up the wooden stairs. She walked into the bathroom and turned on the light, closing the door behind her. She placed her handbag by the door before perching on the edge of the bath, and stared down at the little parcel that she held between her recently manicured fingertips, tugging at the seal at the top of the envelope to open it. She reached in, and pulled out a cardboard box that Owen had presumed was a book. But it wasn't a book. It was a urine test kit.

Claire paced impatiently from one end of the upstairs landing, to the other end. She had had to leave the bathroom. She couldn't bear being in there having to wait instead. She walked to the spare bedroom at the other end of the house, through the door, and over to the windowsill. She looked out on the back garden that Owen had so wonderfully crafted for them. It was a big piece of land, and had come with the job. They were lucky. She knew they were lucky. They had had such a good first year together. Plenty of ups and downs in their professional lives, but they had been there for each other at the end of the day to support each other. Their relationship so far, despite both having tendencies to be hot headed, had been a relatively calm one. No dramas. But Claire feared that was all going to change.

She heard her phone alarm go off in the bathroom, and her stomach twisted. For the past five minutes she had desperately wanted to go and see how her future was set, but now she was allowed to she was terrified. She peered at the back of the garden, and through the trees she could still see her boyfriend down in the cove with his fishing rod, trying to catch some fish to put on the barbeque for dinner. She smiled sadly. He always tried to do best by her. Everything he did he seemed to do for her. To make her happy. But she could only make him happy for so long. The happiness was soon going to end.

Claire slowly made her way out of the spare room, across the landing, and into the bathroom. Her breathing had increased but it felt as though no oxygen was flowing into her lungs as she reached out a shaky hand and picked up the plastic test from its position on the toilet seat. Shit. She was pregnant. She'd never expected to get pregnant. It hadn't been written on the timeline she had in her head. She had never factored it in. It had always been career first and foremost. If she met a man who could deal with her more challenging qualities and love her regardless then she would hopefully marry him. More career. More having a relationship with her husband. Then happily retire. That had been it. That had been her plan. Relatively straight forward. She had adjusted it in her head slightly once Owen had become her boyfriend, replacing the blank face of her 'husband' with his face, though they weren't married. But no children. Children would stop the dream of a lengthy successful career. Children damaged women's careers. And Claire had promised her mother before she died that she would make her proud. That she would become the best of the best. And how could she do that whilst trying to raise a child? She didn't even know how to raise a child!

Claire perched on the closed lid of the toilet, putting her head in her free hand while the positive stick hung in her other. How could she have been so reckless? It was her fault. Of course it was her fault. She had been the one who revealed to Owen months ago that thanks to a genetic disorder her mother had passed down to her it was highly likely she could never get pregnant or have children. Her mother had of course given birth to three children, but it hadn't happened easily. It was probably that reason that children had never been in the vision Claire had had for her future. And to her surprise her boyfriend had smiled, telling her that he had never planned on having children either. So they had started not to worry too much about using protection, and if anything they had upped their action, relieved to finally have all the cards on the table. Months and months had gone by and Claire hadn't fallen pregnant, and the couple were pleased to see that what she had said was true. Then a week ago she had begun to feel ill. She had been feeling tired for weeks but she had put that down to the stress of the impending press conference. Then her lower stomach had started spasming here and there, and that was when Claire wondered if she should take a pregnancy test. She had read once that women who believed they were pregnant without taking a test believed it so much that their body started showing symptoms even though they weren't pregnant. A 'phantom pregnancy' they called it. So in the hope of ridding her mind of a 'phantom pregnancy' she had ordered a pregnancy testing kit online.

A tear rolled down Claire's cheek to the tip of her nose as she hung her head, staring at the test. She was pregnant. Her child, whether boy or girl, would have the same fate as her. Bright red hair. And her freckles too. And pasty skin. Her child was going to be so bullied. It would have no friends. And she would have to stay at home and deal with the school run and making meals, even though she hated cooking, and having to have 'the Talk' when it became a teenager. Not that it would need to worry about that side of life so soon. She didn't lose her virginity until she was twenty. And even then it had been the biggest mistake of her life. Fourteen years on and she still remembered how it had felt waking up the next morning and seeing the empty space beside her. So much for love.

She reached for her cell, and dialled the medical center she was registered at over in Costa Rica. She had had no need to visit them since returning to Isla Nublar . Not until now. She needed some advice. She needed some reassurance before making any decisions. The receptionist at the medical center had been so kind, and following a brief chat informed the red head that a urine test kit would be sent out to her, which they would need for a more reliable confirmation of her pregnancy. When Claire had informed the receptionist of her address the woman on the other end of the line had hesitated, before reassuring Claire that everything would be okay. That was just it though. Everything wouldn't be okay. It couldn't be. Not everything.

Claire heard the back door of the house open and she quickly sat upright, wiping her tears. Owen was sharp, he knew her well, if he saw her crying he would know that more was up than just her worrying about the upcoming press conference. Right, that was that. She could do nothing else until the urine test kit came through the post. There was no need to bring this up with Owen until things were confirmed. There was plenty of research out there saying how unreliable home pregnancy tests were anyway, so it could just be a false result. Claire took a deep breath and forced a smile. Yes, that was it. It was a false result. She wasn't pregnant. She couldn't be pregnant. But God if she was, what would Owen say? Children weren't any more a part of his life plan then they were a part of hers. Would he move back to his little bungalow and only visit when the occasion suited him? Or would he leave her all together? She felt like she knew him well enough to hope that he wouldn't, but people do crazy things when children are involved. Claire felt sick at the thought of the conversation she may have to have with him. No. She wouldn't need to have that conversation because she wasn't pregnant. End of.

Claire screwed the lid tightly on the pot, her urine sample stored safely inside. It felt a little ridiculous that she had to do this when she wasn't even pregnant. But best to just get it over and done with. The sooner she sent it off the sooner she would get the result that confirmed she wasn't pregnant, then she could tell Owen, they could have a good laugh about how silly she had been, and then they could happily get on with their life together. Claire scrambled out of the bathroom, pattering through to their bedroom at the end of the landing, and grabbing the pen from Owen's bedside table. The one he used for his crossword on a Sunday morning when he returned from feeding Blue her breakfast. She pattered back to the bathroom, wanting to utilise the light as the sun had almost set. She wrote her name, date of birth, and ticked the 'female' box, followed by the 'pregnancy test' box. It felt weird to see the word 'pregnancy', but she quickly shrugged the feeling off. It was just a word. She placed the pot gently in the self-addressed envelope that had come in the small parcel, sealed it, and slid it into her handbag, ready to send off with the mail tomorrow down at the hub of the park.

Claire quickly wiped all her makeup and clothes off, jumped in the shower, told herself off for paying particular attention to her stomach when it came to rubbing shower gel on it, having swirled her hand in a circular motion on her stomach far too many times for any normal, non-pregnant woman. She then dashed through to the bedroom, towel drying her long red hair, running a brush through it, then filtering through Owen's "sweatpants draw" for her favourite pair of his sweatpants. She stuffed her legs through the fabric, and pulled them up to her waist. She didn't tie the string as tightly around her waist as she normally did, though she hadn't noticed, it had been an unconscious decision, then strode over to the back of the bedroom door where Owen hung his hoodies. She filtered through them, her hand finding her favourite one, and she slung it over her head just as she heard him calling to her from the kitchen. She pulled the hoodie down over her naked chest, and immediately felt comforted. Her favourite thing about wearing his clothes, not just for the bagginess of them, was because they smelt of him. And the moment she inhaled his scent she felt a warm happiness inside of her.

Claire pattered across the landing, and down the wooden stairs of their house. The lights were now on in the lounge and she made her way through to the kitchen where her boyfriend stood at the stove, dishing their meal up. She leant against the side of the fridge, her arms folded as she watched him with a calm smile on her face. She felt terrible for having to keep what she was doing a secret. But she wouldn't have to keep it from him for much longer. And this knowledge, that perhaps this time next week they would both know for certain if she was pregnant or not, made a knot form in Claire's stomach. She prayed that if she was he wouldn't run away. He wouldn't leave her. She loved him so much. She had become so adjusted to sharing her life with someone now, that the idea of being alone in this house again or being alone in life full stop was a horrible thought made even more unbearable knowing that it would be Owen of all people who would let her down.

"For you Ms Dearing." She heard him say affectionately as he handed her a glass of wine and she took it from him with a smile, planting a kiss on his lips before he turned to pick up their full dinner plates. She almost hesitated taking a slurp the wine, then remembered that she had convinced herself she wasn't pregnant. Because she wasn't. She couldn't be. That test was wrong, remember? She wasn't pregnant. But that still didn't stop Claire from taking sips of her wine that night whilst she ate dinner with Owen out on their pavilion.


	16. The Cove & The Lie

The sun was steadily drawing the day towards dusk, and Owen drove his jeep home, wanting to get back and take the pork joint, that he had put in the oven earlier that day to slowly roast, out of the oven. Today was Claire's birthday. A whole 34 years old, just like he had been a couple of months back. He hadn't been able to get her a present last year because they had only just re-captured Blue and Claire had failed to tell him that it was her birthday until 3 days after. He had felt so guilty about it but she had merely giggled stating that she had never really celebrated her birthday with anyone before, it shouldn't be different now. This year was different though. Owen considered them to be in a serious relationship. They had been together for over a year, the longest he had ever been in a relationship for, and he wasn't going to ruin it by failing to give his girlfriend the birthday she deserved.

He rolled up towards the house and furrowed his brow as he noticed Claire's car was already parked out the front. He was sure this morning when she had kissed him goodbye before heading over to the hub that she had told him she had back-to-back meetings with new potential investors who were keen to support the park that apparently now had a bubble of excitement surrounding it. Pre-sale tickets had been launched two days ago ready for the Park's opening at the end of April. Only six months' to go. The tickets had sold out in under twelve minutes. It seemed the world was desperate to return to the Jurassic era. Even if it had a more herbivore feel to it this time around. So how had Claire got back home before he had? He couldn't remember the last time she had beaten him home.

Owen parked up, got out of his car, and paused to listen. He couldn't hear anything other than the breeze rustling the leaves in the trees nearby and the distant washing of the waves down at the cove. The surrounding houses didn't have any residents in them yet, though Claire had received a call from the residential team over in NY to inform her that from the New Year the managers of each department would be arriving on the island. Apparently some of those managers would be moving their families over too. Owen thought it would be weird to see other people around the area, and down in the cove that he and Claire had essentially been treating like their own private beach. It would especially be weird to see children around. Having lived on an island for thirteen months with no baby, child, or teenager in sight it would definitely be odd. He got on with kids okay he guessed. But babies he couldn't stand. They were so tiny, and dependant, and it was impossible to know what they wanted or what to do with them if they were temperamental. And the cry. He hoped there wouldn't be any babies being moved in with these new families. That would spark the end of his and Claire's peaceful, romantic evenings out on the patio, decking, or pavilion. And he knew if anybody needed those peaceful evenings the most it was Claire, who seemed to be getting more tired by the day, the opening date looming.

Owen began walking up to the house. He was tempted to call Claire's sister and see if they couldn't pop to hers for Thanksgiving next month, just for a little break away from the island. It would be a long flight, but it would be worth it. And he knew Karen wouldn't say no, having been so disappointed that they had been unable to visit at Christmas last year. Owen stepped into the house, calling out Claire's name, but she didn't reply. He furrowed his brow. He noticed her heels were by the staircase, so he made his way up there. But he checked each room, even the bathroom, and she wasn't in there. He quickly freshened up, changing his t-shirt too, and wandered back downstairs, presuming Claire was in the Jacuzzi, perhaps having given herself the afternoon off as a birthday treat. Though it didn't sound like her. He checked the pork, which was slowly roasting perfectly, then made his way out to the decked area of the garden. But Claire wasn't there.

Owen could only think of one more place she could be, so he made his way down the long garden, battling his way between the trees at the bottom, before they opened up to the steps that led down to their cove. And there he saw her. Claire was stood, in her jeans and bare feet, a light blanket wrapped around her shoulders, though he wasn't sure why as it seemed perfectly mild enough. Perhaps it was a comfort thing? He slowly made his way down the wooden steps, his feet landing on the sand silently. As he walked towards her his eyes were entranced by the way her long red hair wisped about in the breeze. He loved it when she wore it down like that, her long fringe pinned back on top of her head. He watched her tilt her head towards him slightly and he knew she heard him coming. It didn't startle her though and he hadn't expected to. They'd been the only two living in this section of the island for a year. It could be nobody else but him. He stood behind her, bringing his arms under hers, wrapping them around her waist, his fingers interlocking at her navel and he felt her take a deep sigh as she placed her own arms over his and relaxed back against his body a bit. He had become accustomed to the height difference between them over the past year. At first he always forgot she was a good foot and a bit shorter than him, she'd always worn heels whenever they had interacted prior to last year, but it hadn't taken him long to get adjusted to bending a little lower to wrap his arms around her waist.

"Happy Birthday" he whispered into her ear, planting a kiss on her neck, before looking out to the ocean in front of them as the sun began to set slowly in the horizon. He expected a flirtatious response, but to his surprise Claire burst into tears. Owen was confused. He had never wanted to do anything to make her cry, particularly on her birthday. When she didn't turn to look at him, he immediately brought his hands away from her and to his side, racing around so his back was to the ocean and he was now facing his girlfriend. Her face was lit by the slow setting sun and he could tell she had been crying far longer than just now. His mind raced over all the possibilities as to why she was crying but he couldn't settle for just one.

"What's wrong?" he asked, not meaning to make his voice sound as panicky as it did. She wasn't looking at him. Why wasn't she looking at him? She was shaking her head, tears rolling down her cheeks.

"I'm sorry Owen." He heard her sob, and his heart plummeted. Why was she apologising? She never apologised. That was her thing. He had never heard her apologise sincerely like this before. He had never seen her cry like this before. What had happened?

"Claire, look at me." He said, pleading with her as he brought his hands to her arms and held them. He could feel tears welling up in his own eyes now, not knowing why she was in the state she was in. This was the first time he had looked at her and felt afraid. Her green eyes finally looked over to him, watery and bloodshot. There was silence except for the sound of the waves behind him, and his heart ramming against his ribcage.

"I lied to you." Owen's heard jumped into his mouth. Oh God, what had she lied to him about? Had she been…having an affair? He began searching frantically in his mind, trying to work out who at the hub she could have had an affair with. But there was nobody that she mentioned when she came home that stuck out to him. And any time he'd been down there recently there hadn't been anybody she'd been acting awkwardly with.

"What's going on?" He watched as tears continued rolling down her cheeks as she tried to find some confidence to continue. The silence between them was deadly, and soon Owen couldn't take it anymore, "Are you having an affair?" He asked quietly, and watched as her once distraught expression turned to horror as she immediately shook her head, "No! No nothing like that!"

"Then what? What did you lie to me about?" He couldn't make any sense of it. Had she lied about how she really felt about him? If she had then she had been doing a really good job at covering it up and making him believe that she loved him. Even now she had her hands gripping the inside of his arms as he held the outside her arms. She was trembling.

"Remember the conversation we had at the beginning of the year, about the condition I have and how I wouldn't be able to have children?" Owen could feel his face drop a little, and he furrowed his brow slightly, "Yeeeaaaahhh?" he said slowly. She had left him a good pause to try to get ahead of what she was telling him but he had decided to just go at her pace, "Well everything I told you is true, I believed it, you believed it, we both believed it because it's true. At least, I thought it was…" and Owen froze as she trailed off, her face had fallen again. Was she trying to tell him what he thought she was trying to tell him?

"I'm pregnant." He heard her whisper to him, and he let go of her, his arms dropping to his sides in shock. He watched her bring her trembling hands to her face, and she began to bawl, her words slurring slightly, overcome with emotion "I know I told you it was impossible, I thought it was, but clearly it wasn't and now we're pregnant and the park opens in six months. We're not going to have time to have a baby. We don't have time. I don't have time. I feel like I've deceived you! I can't bring this baby up. I don't know how to take care of a baby, or a child. I couldn't even take care of my own nephews how am I going to take care of our child? And I can't bring it up here, there's no school, there's not even a supermarket! How am I going to buy diapers? Or baby food? And what if it gets sick? There's no hospital! I can't just take it to the medical center at the hub, that's almost an hour away! And I'm so sorry I lied to you. How are we going to survive? Are we going to survive?"

Owen blinked in shock, trying but failing to listen to all her worries. She was pregnant. They were pregnant. Pregnant. He remembered when she had told him at the beginning of the year that she couldn't foresee herself having babies as it just, physically, wasn't an option for her. And to be honest it had never been in his life plan before he'd got into a relationship with Claire. Something had changed though, and the further he fell in love with her, the more he wanted to marry her and have lots of mini Owen's and Claire's to help boost the population on Isla Nublar or wherever they ended up living. So when she had told him that vital piece of information that set the course of their future together, that she couldn't physically have his babies even if she wanted to, his heart had sank. But only for a moment. Then he had smiled, and told her that children hadn't been on his cards either. It had been enough to calm her. And he got used to the idea very quickly that even though their future was now childless they would be happier than any couple in the world, because they made each other so happy. They had fulfilling jobs, plenty of money, and the perfect relationship.

But now she was pregnant. It had happened, when they thought it wouldn't. And sure it was a shock. A big shock. And it hadn't happened at the best time. Actually it had happened at a really bad time. The worst time, what with the park opening in 6 months' time, but that was no reason to panic. His mother had once told their neighbour when he was a kid that there was never a right time to have a baby. He hadn't understood what she'd meant at the time, but now he did. He watched Claire with her head still in her hands, her long hair wisping about in the breeze. Did she want this? It was all very well and good him being okay with the idea of her carrying his child for the next however many months left of the pregnancy, but it was her body, it was potentially her career on the line here. Did she want to risk all that to bring their child into the world? He noticed she continued to mumble and sob from behind her hands, "Owen I'm so sorry I've ruined your life like this."

Ruined it? Owen couldn't believe that that was one of her worries. Grady's were renowned for adapting to new routine. This baby would definitely be a new routine, sure, but they would survive. And the new routine wouldn't just involve him having to support the baby but also, somehow, having to support Claire. The woman who struggled to keep tabs on how old her own nephews were. She would need a lot of support coming to terms with impending motherhood. And then motherhood itself when it came. If it came. And he knew she was afraid. She didn't react well to spontaneity, his mind flicking back to the very first time he had asked her out four years ago. She had panicked when he suggest they go out that night as it hadn't been in her plan for the day ahead, just like this baby wasn't in her plan for the months ahead. Or even her years ahead. She was panicking.

Owen reached out, and peeled Claire's hands from her face gently. He brought her closer to him, bringing his hand up and wiping the tears from her cheeks as he spoke, a reassuring smile on his face, "Claire, do you want this baby?" he waited with baited breath as he watched her pause to look out at the sunset, clearly thinking it over. "You wouldn't be bringing it up alone you know" his words made her turn back to him, and he continued, "I'm not going anywhere Claire. Ever." and she took a deep shuddering breath as he kept smiling at her, caressing her cheek gently, "We never planned for this though." He heard her confess. He knew this had been her fear. Why it was all such a shock. "We could have never planned for this, Claire." He replied, and he noticed she had stopped crying.

Her face fell a little as she thought of something else, "What if I screw things up?" she whispered, and the way she looked up at him, her eyes like watery saucers, made his heart melt. He was still in shock, but her reaction seemed to be easing the shock somewhat. Owen let a tiny chuckle as he watched her work her way through her thought process, answering her questions the best he could, "You won't screw things up."

"I'll have to give up work."

Owen shook his head, bringing his arms around her, holding her safely as he looked into her watery eyes, "I'll be here. You work as much or as little as you need to."

These words must have been golden to the woman in front of him, whose face was beginning to relax and her breathing had certainly regulated itself a little better, making Owen a little less panicky. Of course she had been concerned about having to be a housewife. The woman who hated cooking. Who hated being stuck in the house at the best of times, let alone with a baby. "I have no idea how to look after a baby" she confessed with a whisper, bringing her hands up to his chest, her fingertips fiddling a little with a bit of the fabric of his t-shirt. If she didn't have such a strong and sharp personality normally then Owen was sure she probably would've stuck out her bottom lip.

"And you think I do?" he asked, and to his delight she finally relieved a small watery smile at his honest response, "Claire I'm terrified of babies. I don't know how to hold them, or feed them, or change their diapers. But the idea of learning all of that with you, with our baby…suddenly I don't feel so terrified anymore." And he knew there was no way he would be as bad at holding the baby or taking care of it as her. But he didn't tell her that bit. Owen stood and watched the woman in his arms as she was considering all that he had said.

He watched as Claire took another deep breath, her smile still a little unsure but there all the same, and asked tentatively "So…we're having a baby then?" and he nodded with a smile. He watched as she bit her lip, then her face broke into a smile as she raised her eyebrows in disbelief, and she let out a small giggle. This was going to be the first of many moments where she would be uncertain of her future, and a baby was the one thing out of a woman's control once she had decided to have it. It would grow, and poke around in her belly, dig into her ribs, sit on her bladder. And as easy as it was to say 'this is the due date' there would be no telling if the baby would actually be born on that day. The worst was yet to come and Owen knew it.

He watched as she stepped on her tiptoes, her hands cupping his cheeks as she pulled him into a deep and tender kiss. As he got lost in the feel of her lips on his, his arms snaked around her waist, pulling her close to him. Inside her was growing a little human that was half him and half her, and he couldn't be happier at the idea of becoming a father. So the baby bit sucked, but it wouldn't be for long, then it would be crawling, then walking. Then he could take it to the raptor paddock to see Blue. And Claire could take it to the T-Rex paddock too. The T-Rex.

"Hey," said Owen, breaking his kiss with Claire who looked up at him curiously, "That's why the T-Rex and Blue have been acting so differently around you." And he saw Claire's expression change as she realised he was right. Trust their dinosaurs to know his girlfriend was pregnant before he did.


	17. The Call & Veto

December at 10am?" Claire stood and thought about it. There was now two ferry's that ran to Costa Rica every day. The first left at 10am. The second at 6pm. The return ferries were at 8am and 4pm. "Can we make it more around midday? Transport issues…" Claire replied. She didn't want to have to explain that she lived on Isla Nublar and that there was a limited amount of ferries. No doubt the topic would come up with her doctor eventually. "How about we make it 1pm? Then you can ask me questions, we can discuss your plan for the birth, and you'll be 11 weeks into your pregnancy by then so you'll have your first scan too."

Claire blinked, trying not to panic as her doctor mentioned 'birth' and 'scan'. 11 weeks. That must mean she was about 6 weeks pregnant at the moment. She agreed before saying goodbye to her doctor, ended the call, and let her cell slide out of her hand. It bounced on the surface of her bed and landed face down. Claire took a deep breath. It was a good job she hadn't got that call when she was in the car or at a paddock or in a meeting. No, she had received it just as she had stepped into her bedroom. She had popped back home to pick up a spare set of clothes to take over to her new office back at the hub. With every office she had ever had, she always had a spare set of clothes to ensure she always looked presentable, which was becoming more necessary by the day. Her working days were now spent more indoors in meetings and being interviewed by members of the press or sending out statements than being out in the paddocks like she had been doing back when they had moved to the island a year ago. She was back to having to wear stiff smart suits, though today she had just chosen to wear smart black jeans and a smart blouse. It was too humid to be wearing a jacket today.

Claire looked at the empty space in the bed beside her. Owen was going to freak when she told him that she was pregnant. Pregnant. It still sounded weird. She was pregnant . She had spent so many years believing that she couldn't get pregnant to the point that she had told herself that she was okay with that. That she wouldn't come home to a gaggle of children that bounded up to her and cuddled her tight. In seven months' time that would change. There would be no 'coming home from work' as she'd already be at home. Stuck. If he chose to stay with her then Owen would be out of the house, every day, ensuring that Blue was okay. Still training her. While Claire had no other choice but to stay in the house with their baby.

Her eyes began to water as she thought about what the members of The Board would say. Her bosses would undoubtedly encourage her to step down into an easier role, where she wouldn't have to focus so much of her time and energy on running the whole island. The island. The park. It was opening in six months! She'd be nearly eight months pregnant by then. She would be waddling around, struggling with the heat. Nobody would take her seriously because of her inevitably large bump. How was she going to run a park if nobody took her seriously? And then the baby would be here. If Owen chose to stay he would be away at work, coming home in the evenings. He would be so affectionate, she knew he would, but she would end up resenting him. And the last thing she ever wanted to do was resent the man she loved.

Tears fell down her face as she stared at her bedroom. So much had changed for the better in the past year. This room which had once been the room she'd had to force herself to go into was now the room that she loved. She and Owen spent a lot of time in here. Reading, chatting, giggling, sleeping, messing around…and messing around was what had got her into this mess in the first place. She and Owen would still stay in this room of course and she'd suggest their baby have the room at the other end of the house as its nursery. The room that faced the back garden. That was a nice bedroom. But if Owen decided he didn't want to stay, what then? She'd have to bring the baby up alone. She had no one here on the island. She would have to quit her job here and move to New York to be closer to her sister. Karen would support her no problem. But she didn't want Karen. She wanted Owen.

By now Claire was bawling into her hands, trying to stop at intervals, but the idea of Owen reacting badly to this big news was what was channelling her fear and upset. For a good twenty minutes Claire sat on her bed, rocking back and forward gently, sobbing. She thought about her potential two futures – one with Owen and one without Owen - that had only one common theme running through them: she would be a mother. She would be bringing up a child. This tiny version of herself that would bear so much resemblance to Owen was scary to imagine. Because if he chose not to walk down the path with her and help raise their child then she would forever be reminded of the love they had once shared, with the small human being the result of their love and that very reminder.

Claire's body shivered briefly, evidently a reaction to the crying, and she found herself standing up and walking over to her wardrobe. She slid the door across with a sniff, standing on her tiptoes, and reached up to the top shelf, pulling a large blanket down. She wrapped it around her shoulders for comfort, picked her cell up off the bed, and began making her way out of the bedroom. She stopped at the top of the stairs and instead of going down them she carried on through to the room at the other side of the house. The nice spare bedroom. The room that would become her child's nursery. Her child. She was pregnant . Claire shook her head slightly in disbelief as she stepped into the room, admiring for the first time how light it was, the sunlight filtering through the large double windows that stood in front of her, and another set on the wall to her right. From the height of the sun in the sky she could tell it wouldn't be long until dusk. It wouldn't be long until Owen got home. It wouldn't be long until she changed his life forever.

"So how far gone are you?" she heard her boyfriend ask curiously as he eased himself down in the space beside her on the couch. She automatically brought her feet up, resting them on his lap, and he automatically brought his hands up to massage them. It was routine for them. Whenever they were sat on this sofa and not up to anything too active, he would rub her feet while she read a book and he read the newspaper.

"Six weeks" Claire answered, before letting out a gentle sigh, already feeling the benefits of his large hands massaging the base of her right foot. She saw him furrow his brow slightly as he paused the rubbing, looking at the coffee table in front of the couch thoughtfully. She noticed a grin grow on his face, "What?" she asked curiously and he let out a small giggle before looking over at her.

"So, I got you pregnant the night of our anniversary?" Claire paused, thinking back on that night. He was right, it had been six weeks since they had celebrated one year of being together.

Claire let out a deep shuddering breath as Owen rolled his naked body off her naked body, and collapsed onto his side of the bed beside her. Both were panting heavily. Claire looked to her left with a broad smile on her face, looking at Owen who was still trying to catch his breath as he looked up at the ceiling of their bedroom. This time last year they had fallen into the bed of their hotel suite, having finally succumbed to the sexual tension they had built throughout the dinner they had had with her family in the hotel's dining room. And it wouldn't have been long after that that they jumped into round two. Closely followed by round three, then four, then five… A year ago they had been like teenagers who had just discovered sex. Now they were more like mature young adults. Still enjoying the sex, making the most of the opportunity most days, but ensuring there was plenty of teasing and tension before-hand, and a good bit of rest afterwards. They now knew each other's bodies very well.

Claire saw Owen look at her, his breathing beginning to relax as he shot her a big grin, ands brought his arm up so she could nestle up to him. She slung her right arm over his torso, and brought her lips up to his neck, kissing it tenderly. As he let out one final sigh she giggled, and he giggled with her, looking down at her and her up at him. As their eyes met, Claire couldn't help the warm feeling she felt inside of her entire body. She felt so loved. And so in love. If he got down on one knee right here, right now, and asked her to marry him she would say yes in a heartbeat. She had no fear about their future together. She didn't care where they lived, where they worked, so long as they were together. And she could tell, just by the way he was looking at her, that he felt the same way.

Claire remembered how loved she had felt that night, it was the same love that she had felt from him the moment they had first awoken together in their hotel suite hours after leaving the 'recovery hanger' in Costa Rica, battered and bruised but together. That love she had felt from him for over a year. But the night she fell pregnant, the force of that love had felt overwhelming. It were as though every cell in her body was composed of microscopic hearts, each containing a piece of Owen's love, and they made up her body, making her feel warm and fuzzy. And with that memory, Claire suddenly felt okay about the baby growing inside her. This tiny little thing that had been created out of such a strong love. She suddenly realised she was smiling at Owen, who looked back at her, mirroring her smile. It were as though the couple just knew, without saying anything, that this thing which was going to change their lives so very dramatically, was something of a miracle. Something to be marvelled at.

Claire pattered into the bedroom, tugging down the baggy t-shirt she had pulled out of Owen's 'sweatpants draw' earlier in the evening, and crawled into her side of the bed. Her boyfriend had been laying in the bed already, his arms behind his head as he stared at the ceiling, deep in thought. It had been an odd evening. A lovely evening, but odd. The pork that Owen had cooked had been beautiful, and he had even ordered a small birthday cake and a candle for her so they could have a bit of dessert. He had also bought her a locket, which held a photo of his face inside. She loved it, and vowed to wear it every day at work, to keep him close to her. But if someone had told her a week ago that the evening of her birthday was going to mostly be filled with conversations between her and her boyfriend about their baby she would be having in seven months' time she would have told them off for being so absurd. But that was exactly what had happened.

Claire had told Owen about the scan in a few weeks' time, which he had immediately informed her he would be going to, much to her relief. They had chatted about how long they reckoned she would be able to work for, which Claire had immediately said she planned on going until her waters broke, a thought that made both of them feel a little sick. And, as a result of that decision, their conversation had also turned to how and when she was going to tell The Board of Directors. To which Claire suggested that it would be best to tell them once they had been to the first scan. She also decided that she wouldn't be informing her bosses who the father was. It wasn't their business. She and Owen then talked about the house and what changes they would need to do to baby-proof it.

Claire sighed as she laid back in bed, and without realising had begun to lightly trace her fingertips over her lower stomach as she thought how odd it was that she now had the responsibility of carrying, protecting and growing a baby inside her womb. Their baby. Half her, half Owen. She felt him turn his body so he faced her, propping his head up with his hand, leaning on his elbow. She felt his left hand join her hands on her stomach. Claire turned to her left and a calm smile spread across her face as she saw her boyfriend looking at her contently. This was what mattered. Right here. Being with him. She had no idea why she had been so afraid of his reaction. He would have never left her. Never in a million years. No matter how afraid he was. No matter how afraid he would be. He'd said it himself, he was terrified, but he didn't mind learning how to take care of a baby, so long as he could do it with her. The moment he had told her that, it had felt as though a huge weight had lifted from her shoulders. As though the fog in her mind had begun to clear, and the new path she was about to go down was far less rocky because he was with her. He would be with her the whole way.

"So, feel free to veto this name suggestion…" she heard him begin and Claire held her breath. She hadn't even thought about names yet. She'd only just begun to come to terms with the fact that she was having a child. A little person. Choosing a name for it was a huge deal. It would be the name that was going to stick with them for the rest of their life. And it would need to suit a red-head. Because, unfortunately for their child, they were going to be ginger. That was their fate.

"…if it's a boy…Rex." Claire squealed in delighted shock that he had dared even suggest such a name, and laughed loudly.

"VETO!"

She didn't even care that he looked taken aback at her reaction of his suggestion. There was no way they were naming their child after a dinosaur. Even when it was named after 'her dinosaur'. How tacky. If their child wasn't bullied for their ginger hair then it would definitely be bullied for its name.

"And before you suggest it, I veto the name Blue, too. Whether it's a boy or girl we are not naming it after anything in or around this park!" Claire said, a huge grin on her face, despite her firm voice. She meant it. And she saw Owen roll his eyes with a grin.

"Okay, okay. I'll keep thinking then." She giggled as he leant over and gave her a firm kiss on her lips, before she turned onto her right side, and he spooned her from behind, his left hand still remaining protectively over her stomach. They both sighed happily. Claire was exhausted. She had had such an emotional afternoon and evening. And to top that off she was now using up whatever energy she thought she had left on growing a baby. She was working without even noticing. Well, she hadn't noticed yet. But her body would soon change, and she knew it.

"I love you" she heard Owen whisper to her sleepily, and she smiled. He really did love her. This had been the best birthday she had ever had. It had only taken 34 years.

"I love you too" she replied, and within a matter of moments, she had fallen into a deep sleep.


	18. The Poster & The Scan

Owen ran as fast as he could across the metal walkway of Blue's paddock. His heart was racing, and his palms felt sweaty as he remembered how upset she had sounded on the phone. He practically leapt down the metal stairs, five steps at a time, before running with speed towards his jeep. He heard Barry calling out to him from the open door of their office beside the paddock, asking him what was going on, but Owen didn't answer him. He didn't even fully process what his friend had yelled out at him. He had to get to his car. He had to drive over to the hub. To Claire. And fast.

Owen sat awkwardly on the cushioned bench that ran the length of the clinic's waiting room. He looked to his left and Claire was sat beside him, bolt upright, her fingers fiddling nervously with the button hole of her suit jacket. He remembered how worried she had been this morning. Not necessarily worried about the baby or the appointment, but about what she was going to wear. She had been pacing around their bedroom since 6am, having not slept very well overnight. Any time she got out of bed Owen woke up, not because she was noisy, but because he was always concerned about her. What if something was wrong with the baby? But any time he asked his girlfriend with a sleepy mumble if she was okay, she would always reply with a sleepy sigh, saying yes, before making her way through to the bathroom to pee for the millionth time.

When they had finally both got up at 7am, the sun beginning to rise above the horizon at the front of the house and through their window, Claire had begun panicking about what she was going to wear. She'd kept asking him what she should wear but he had no idea. He'd never had to go to a scan before. He didn't know any more than she did. He'd suggested at one point she wear a pair of his sweat pants and t-shirt, just to feel comfortable, and for a moment her expression had waivered, as though she'd considered it. But then common sense had shone through, and she rattled within her closet trying to find something. She'd mentioned on several occasions how worried she was that people may see them together and begin spreading rumours. Rumours that would eventually make their way over to her bosses, but Owen had told her that people would find out eventually. Which unfortunately made the woman panic, and she manically tugged different outfits out of her closet to try on. She eventually decided upon a smart pant-suit, and had begged Owen to put his smart shirt and trousers on. Which he did with no hesitation. The way they presented themselves to her doctor was important to her, and Claire was important to him, so the last thing he wanted to do was stress her out further by refusing to dress correctly for the occasion.

Now they sat, waiting patiently for the doctor to call their name out. The ferry had got them into Costa Rica just after 11am, and after a brief herbal tea at the café around the corner, the couple had decided it would be just easier to wait it out in the clinic until 1pm. But waiting for over an hour was easier said than done. Owen tapped his left knee up and down quickly as he stared at a poster which said in bold black letters at the top "Does your child have a high fever?", below that were the words, "Does your child have cold hands and feet?", and below that were the words "Does your child breathe rapidly?" and in the centre of the poster in bright red capital letters "MENINGITIS. KNOW THE SYMPTOMS" and below the red writing was a particularly poorly looking young child. Owen's stomach plummeted. It hadn't occurred to him that once their baby was born it might get sick. He had no idea what meningitis was but it didn't sound good.

Owen tapped his knee faster in concern then suddenly felt Claire bring her hand down to rest on it, and he stopped, sitting up and looking at her. She had given him a reassuring smile, and he took her hand. As he sat back on the bench she leant into him with a sigh. He was impressed with how resilient she had been over the past few weeks since they had found out she was pregnant. She had been down at the hub every day, her new office being a five minute walk from the T-Rex paddock. The dinosaur had made no changes in the way it seemed to interact with Claire, and now that the couple knew why the T-Rex was acting the way she was towards the woman, Claire almost felt an even closer connection to the animal. As though she was keeping her secret for her. Owen was sometimes a little offended that the T-Rex didn't trust him with his girlfriend, glaring at him if he stood too close to Claire when he visited her at the paddock, which had become far more frequent recently.

Since finding out he was going to be a father Owen had been walking around work in a sort of daze. He couldn't help his mind flickering to the future, imagining what it would be like to have a son or daughter. To teach them to fish, and cook, and climb trees, and interact with dinosaurs. Their mother could teach them to read, how to be organised, and dress appropriately. He had it all mapped out in his mind. But above all things he would dote on this child. He would protect it. He would nurture it. He would really, really love it. All with the help of the woman beside him, who had rested her left hand tenderly over her stomach. She may think she was incapable of taking care of a child, but Owen knew in his heart that she would be such a good mother to his child because she would try so hard to be one. To be the best.

"Ms Dearing?" Owen jumped as the doctor poked her head out of a door near to them, calling out Claire's title. He stood up and Claire led the way through to the small room. As the doctor greeted them and asked them to take a seat Owen was suddenly relieved that Claire had insisted they dressed relatively smartly. He would have felt very out of place if he had worn one of his scruffy t-shirts and cargo pants. The doctor smiled at them, asking Claire how she was feeling. Claire had confessed to the doctor that she was feeling very tired, sometimes a bit sicky, but all in all not too different.

Owen's stomach did a back-flip when the doctor asked them to go through to a side-room so she could take a scan of Claire's womb. This was it. They were actually going to see proof, in front of their very eyes, that they really were going to have a baby. He watched as Claire perched awkwardly on the edge of the bed, not sure what to do, but the doctor told her to just lay down. There was a screen opposite him, on the other side of Claire, and he stared at it. He had a lump in his throat and he could feel himself trembling. He wasn't sure if it was through nerves or excitement. Both he guessed. Owen felt Claire take his hand and he looked down at her. She looked terrified. He gave her his very best reassuring smile, and a small wink, whilst giving her hand a squeeze, and she gave him a small smile back whilst the doctor placed a dollop of cool gel on the lower section of Claire's stomach. Owen's heart was racing and he held his breath as a black and white grainy image appeared on the screen. He had no idea what he was looking for. What sign there was of their baby. He could tell by the way Claire had relaxed the grip on his hand that she was also confused as to what they were looking for. Then suddenly the doctor spoke, cutting the silence in the room.

"Aha. There's your baby." And the woman brought a finger up to the screen and pointed to a relatively large dot in the middle of it. Owen squinted. That was it. There it was! That was their baby. He couldn't believe how small it was. And how much more it needed to grow. He looked down at his girlfriend in amazement, hardly able to believe that that was their baby, and it was currently in her body. Right now. Busy growing, if very slowly. And suddenly Owen was overcome with emotion as he saw the smile grow on Claire's face. He was so proud of her already, she was doing such a great job, even though there was still a long time to go until their baby was ready to be brought into the world. But she was smiling. And he was smiling. And he saw her look over at him, her eyes glistening with tears, as he bent down and kissed her gently.

Several minutes later, whilst gripping Claire's hand, Owen sat on the seat beside her, and opposite the doctor. He could feel the red head squeezing his hand every so often, presumably any time she thought about or realised that they were pregnant. The couple listened as the doctor reeled off ideal dietary requirements and exercise tips for Claire to ensure she had a healthy pregnancy, to which Claire, true to form, had begun writing in a notebook she'd brought with her. The doctor mentioned their second scan would be in a couple of months' time, and that she would book them in for a few antenatal classes to attend towards the end of the pregnancy. This was the part that Claire hesitated at, and explained that as much as she wanted to attend the classes it would be impossible. Not only did they live on Isla Nublar , but they both worked there too, and as manager of the park she wouldn't have time to leave to go to a class, what with the park reopening at the end of April. The doctor had looked surprised and Owen had had to hide his smirk as his girlfriend insisted they could not go over to Costa Rica come the spring. After several long minutes the doctor had offered to look into having one of the antenatal instructors travel to them to take the class, to which Claire agreed would be a better option. Owen had noticed the concern on the doctor's face at the mention of the park, but he knew Claire wouldn't have, and it was probably best that way. Claire would have got beautifully defensive of the park, and her position there. Both were very important to her.

It had been two hours since they had returned from the appointment, and Owen had left Claire at the hub before taking the fifty minute drive to his raptor's paddock. But he had only been there for an hour before he had got a call from her. She had sounded panicky. Upset. She had asked for him to come to her office as she needed him. He hadn't asked her why, he had just immediately ran to his car. She never cried at work. And she never asked him to visit her. He always just turned up. And he always enjoyed seeing the look of delight on her face the moment she realised he was there visiting her.

He skidded the jeep to a halt outside the block of offices he knew she'd be in, jumping out of the vehicle and through the double doors. He was greeted by the receptionist but didn't say hello in return. Instead he ran up the four flights of stairs it took to get to Claire's floor, having no patience for the elevator. He tore his way down the corridor, and almost broke the handle when he burst into Claire's office without knocking. He saw her sat on the floor, leaning back on the wall to his left, her legs stretched out. She had her hand on her stomach and his heart dropped as she looked up at him, evidently distraught, tears rolling down her cheeks.


	19. An Empty Control Room & A Shock

Claire leant back against the wall of her office. Her bosses had left about twenty minutes ago and since then she had been pacing up, down, around and around the room. Owen was on his way. She had had to call him. She couldn't think of anybody else she wanted to be with more than him right now. Nobody else would understand. Nobody else would be able to comfort her. With a sigh she slid down the wall, landing gently on the cool floor of her office. She brought her legs out in front of her, and her hands up to her face, and she began to cry.

The jeep pulled up to the front of the staff entrance to the T-Rex paddock. Claire leant over from the passenger seat, placing a hand on Owen's arm as she went to kiss him on the cheek, but he turned as her face neared his, and his lips landed on hers. If it had been any other day she would have immediately pulled away and looked around frantically, worried that a member of staff would see them and start telling everyone in the park. But the moment she had felt his kiss on her mouth, she had closed her eyes, the image of their baby on the screen at the health clinic appearing in her mind. If anyone was to ask her how it had felt to see her baby for the very first time, that little blob on the screen that looked nothing like a baby, she would describe it as though seeing the sun rising above the horizon on a warm summer's day. It was as though any fear or darkness she had been experiencing about the uncertainty of her future suddenly cleared, and instead there was this light. This thing. This baby. She pulled her face away from Owen's, opening her eyes with a smile, then realising that one kiss wasn't enough she quickly kissed his lips again before reaching out and opening the car door on her side.

"I'll pick you up around eight?" she heard him call out to her and she paused. Thanks to Owen's quick initiative they had managed to pay the owner of the postal boat that travelled daily to and from Isla Nublar a hefty sum of money to take them back over to the island straight after their appointment, meaning the couple were able to return to the island by 3pm. Owen had never picked her up from the hub before, and she smiled at his offer, working out in her mind that four and a half hours should be time enough for her to check that everything she had asked her teams to do while she was away from the island had been done. It had taken her almost a week of observations to gather the confidence in her teams that they could cope without her for half a day. Owen was right when he had assured her that her teams knew the routine and her expectations. He'd also been right when he'd told her that the teams would have to cope without her for a few days in June while she went to have the baby. That hadn't occurred to her before.

"See you at eight." She said with a flirtatious grin and she suddenly went giddy when he gave her a wink and a grin. She wasn't sure why she'd gone giddy. Hormones she supposed. As soon as Owen said three simple words, "I love you" Claire let out a little giggle, taking a beat to look for any staff near the car and, once feeling sure there were none, replied with a chirpy "I love you too". She slammed the door of the jeep, and began walking over to the staff entrance to the paddock, with a grin on her face as she still felt the echo of Owen's kiss on her lips. Her smile broadened as she heard her boyfriend release a loud wolf whistle, just as she got to the staff entrance, and she waved at him in a shooing manner, letting out another giggle and shaking her head slightly as he drove away with a short beep of the jeep horn.

Claire made her way through to the control room of the T-Rex's paddock. She furrowed her brow to see no members of the team in the room. So much for being able to leave them in charge. She envisioned the moment she had left yesterday evening once she had given the dinosaur her final meal of the day, and informed the team that she wouldn't be back until around the same time the next day, that they would have celebrated. Perhaps even thrown a party. Delighted to know that their boss was finally leaving them to do their jobs for a whole day instead of watching their every move, making sure everything was right for the dinosaur. Her T-Rex. But she had never expected them to leave the control room!

Claire paced through the door at the end of the room. The corridor outside was also silent. Just the odd whirs of the computer systems in the room she had just left. She took a right turn, walking down the corridor, her heels echoing back at her as she brought a hand to her belly, rubbing it automatically without thinking. If her team didn't take her seriously now, what were they going to be like when they found out she was pregnant? Immediately the question would be who the father was. While Owen had visited the paddock on several occasions over the past few weeks it was more to observe how the T-Rex interacted with Claire, and Claire had given the team the excuse that he was there to observe the dinosaur's unusual behaviour and try to make sense of it all, even though the couple now knew why. And that excuse seemed to work. She called him "Mr Grady" whenever he visited, and they had even staged a few heated discussions so people figured they didn't get on. Nobody really noticed. The only time Owen ever placed an arm around her or a hand on her back was if they were absolutely 100% certain nobody was watching. Which was fortunately a lot of the time. She didn't tell the team that Owen was there to see her because she was carrying his child.

Claire pushed her way through the door into the 'viewing tunnel' of the paddock and froze, the door swinging shut behind her. In front of her stood the T-Rex team, gathered in a group, chatting together with concern. The moment she had entered the room they turned to look at her, their voices turned to a quiet hush. Some looked at her sadly. Others looked at her nervously. And one or two looked terrified. Claire stepped forward a few paces. She looked at them half angrily, half confused. Why were they all in here? But suddenly her heart dropped as she saw a few figures at the back of the group push their way to the front, to stand in front of her. Claire could feel the colour drain from her face as she stared at the stern expressions of her bosses. The Board of Directors. One of them turned to the T-Rex team, motioning for them to leave the tunnel, to which everybody did. In silence. Silence that was deafening to Claire who had chosen to link her fingertips together and loll her hands in front of her stomach rather than lay them flat on her stomach protectively. Once the last person had left the room the four men stood before her gave her forced smiles.

"Claire," began Richard, the head of The Board, and it was enough to get her heart racing. Why were they here? They had come on the one day she was away from the island. And she hadn't told them she was leaving the island for the morning. She'd just done it. Having to tell them would've meant having to tell them the reason why she was going. And telling them the reason why she was going would've meant telling them she was pregnant. Right now didn't feel like the right time to be telling them. "We'd been told you were away at a meeting this morning. Anything we should be concerned about?" Claire found herself forcing her own grin, with pursed lips, and shaking her head firmly before Tim, another member of The Board spoke, "We thought you would come here the moment you returned, that's why we waited here to meet with you."

There was a pause, as though the men expected the woman to speak, but the red head remained quiet. Until she knew why they were here she wouldn't say anything that could potentially get her into trouble. "We had called, but you had your calls diverted to your receptionist this morning." Tim continued, and Claire swallowed loudly. She was feeling nervous. The tone of his voice just then was not one of a man who was happy that they couldn't contact the manager of the island. There was another pause, but Claire kept her mouth shut. Next was the turn of Marcus, who was normally the quiet one of the four. His tone, however, was the most serious she had ever heard it, "Well it's a good job you're here now. We need to discuss the future of this asset." She watched as he motioned to the glass beside them and she knew he was referring to her dinosaur. She could feel her palms getting sweaty.

"Claire we're very impressed with the way you have run the clean-up process. Really we are. The park looks fantastic and we couldn't be more pleased that you've managed to do it all below budget." Claire nodded, acknowledging the brief compliment that Richard had given her. She knew she'd done a good job. She'd worked very hard to make sure everything had run smoothly. "Here's the thing," Claire held her breath. This didn't sound good. "We can't open while this asset remains on the island." Claire shuffled her feet nervously, trying not to jump to any conclusions of what they might be suggesting as they continued, "Now, after our last visit, and seeing the way the asset seemed to interact with you, we looked into the possibility of moving it to a different part of the world," Claire's hope lifted, "But there is no national park or zoo that is willing to buy a T-Rex. Especially since the last asset out of containment on this island caused so many deaths." Claire could feel her heart rate begin to race. They weren't going to say it. "Claire, I'm afraid we have no other choice. This asset needs to be destroyed." They said it. Claire felt a lump in her throat as she forced back the tears that began to form in her eyes. She would not cry. Certainly not in front of them.

Tim piped up again, trying to explain their plan of action, but the word 'destroyed' still rattled around in her ears, "Now it's not like we can do what we did with that other asset. The water one. Erm…"

"The Mosasaurus?" Claire offered, though her tone was flat. The Mosasaurus's death was a difficult one to monitor. It was thanks to that dinosaur, along with her T-Rex, that the I-Rex died. That she, Owen, and her nephews were saved. When she, Owen and their team had first arrived back on the island almost 15 months ago the Mosasaurus had been difficult to keep tabs on due to the depth and span of the pool it lived in. It had had no food for a week by the time they had arrived on the island, and had had no food for three weeks by the time one of the team had finally first spotted it. Presumably it had been living on the remains of whatever creatures had fallen or landed on the surface of the tank's water. But that was not enough for the creature that would get through many sharks a day during feeding times back when the park had been open. Soon sightings of the Mosasaurus became less and less and Claire had had to make the executive decision to focus more on re-capturing the land dinosaurs. So at the beginning of the year, an underwater drone had been sent down into the tank, to try to locate the body of the dinosaur, to see if it had somehow survived without food for several months. It had not. The drone found the body after a thirty minute scour of the tank floor. A clean-up team had been flown in to retrieve the deceased dinosaur, and it had subsequently been sent to a lab to be cleaned up and stuffed, then sold to a natural history museum for millions of dollars. In a few weeks the tank was due to be drained so the area could be turned into a site for families to go between the animal feeding times. The plan was to have rollercoasters, stalls, booths, an ice rink…

"Yes, the Mosasaurus. That was relatively easy. But with this one it'll take more than just leaving it to starve, we'll need something strong and fast to kill it. Something slow could make things unsafe." Claire felt sick as they spoke about her dinosaur in the way that they did. "We've called the same team who disposed of those rogue pteradon's at the end of last year. They'll be here in two days." Two days. That was barely any time at all. "We're sorry Claire. We know you were getting on well with this one." This one. What did they know? They couldn't possibly know of the connection she and the T-Rex had.

Claire remained frozen to the spot as some of the men walked past her towards the door to leave the viewing tunnel. One remained in front of her who hadn't spoken. Daniel. He was always the sternest one of all the members of The Board, and he looked at her seriously, "It's only 5 months until the park opens Claire. You understand why we had to do this?" Claire nodded, her expression still flat, her eyes threatening to water. "Good. We'll be back next month. In the meantime, get your calls redirected to your cell again please." And Claire gave him a pursed smile with a short nod. Daniel left the viewing tunnel, leaving the woman to stare at the glass in shock at what she had just heard. If the afternoon team hadn't returned to the room so soon Claire would have broken down. She began walking out of the room, calling Owen as she did, telling him to come over to her office. That she needed him. The moment she had heard his voice on the phone she had almost burst into tears right there and then, but she couldn't show any signs of weakness. Not here. Not in front of one of her teams. The team that she presumed had been told by The Board about the change that was going to come. That was why they had mostly looked sad. Claire walked through the control room, and out of the paddock into the mild air. She began sniffing, mostly to try to keep her tears from falling, as she scurried across the pavement path, and over into her office block.

She heard footsteps running up the corridor. Claire brought her hands down and turned to face the door of her office just as Owen burst through it. The moment she saw him a wave of relief washed over her body. It was odd, she knew he wouldn't be able to do anything about the main situation, but if he just put his arms around her or spoke to her or did both of those things then she knew she would feel better about the situation. He always knew the right thing to say. She saw him look at her on the floor, then his expression turn panicky as he looked at her hands on her belly. She shook her head almost hopelessly when he asked her if she was okay, a reaction that evidently made him panic more, and she watched as he paced over to her quickly. She held her hands up towards him and he took them, pulling her up. She smoothed her hands down her suit with a deep breath, her tears having fortunately subsided for the time being. She knew her face must look a mess at the moment.

"What's happened? Is it the baby?" Her heart skipped a beat as her boyfriend looked at her desperately, dying for her to talk to him, to give him answers. She looked into his eyes, and was so overwhelmed by how protective he already seemed of her and their unborn baby that her eyes began watering again. What was happening to her? She never cried like this.

"The baby is fine." She started, and Owen's face immediately began to relax a little. "The Board were here though. When I arrived. Except they weren't here, they were at paddock nine." She saw the colour drain from Owen's face the moment she had mentioned the board.

"Did they see us?"

Claire shook her head and again Owen's face seemed to relax a little, yet he furrowed his brow a little in confusion as to why she was so upset. She felt him take hold of her hands that she had left by her side. "Owen they're going to destroy the T-Rex." It wasn't until she had said it in person that it actually sounded real. She still had a hard time believing it. Seeing his face though, knowing that what she had told him was just as upsetting to him as it was to her, gave Claire the ounce of strength left in her body she needed to continue talking. "They've got a squad coming in on Saturday to do it. I've got to organise where the paddock nine team are going to go." She brought a hand to her face and sighed into it as Owen held her other hand with his. She rubbed her wet cheeks, and looked down at her fingers noticing that they had black smears on them. Great. Her mascara had run. "It's going to be difficult to find positions for them all on the island."

"That and they're going to struggle. Going from caring for a carnivore to caring for herbivores – big change." Owen said thoughtfully, and Claire realised that she hadn't thought of that. She hadn't thought of the T-Rex team and how it was going to affect them. She'd only thought about herself. Her stomach twisted. How selfish of her. Good managers weren't supposed to think about how actions were going to affect themselves, they were supposed to think about how they were going to affect staff and the business. She felt her boyfriend wrap his arms around her, and she looked up at him. As soon as she did she felt a wave of exhaustion.

"Everything's going to work itself out Claire."

And Claire found herself nodding, even though she wasn't entirely sure that it would. The Board admitted that they had noticed something between her and the T-Rex, and they had decided to get rid of the animal anyway. How would they react when she told them she was pregnant? How would they react when they found out that the park's raptor trainer was the father? And as Owen pulled her into a hug Claire made a promise to herself. She would make sure that no matter what, The Board would never find out her child's paternity. And if they did? Well, she would have to make sure that it was years from now, when she had done enough work with the park that the tiny detail of her and Owen being in a relationship didn't matter anymore.


	20. Fairy Lights & The Stifled Sob

Owen sat on the edge of the bottom of the bed. He was hunched over, his elbows resting on top of his thighs as he held his head in his hands. He sat in the silence of their bedroom in nothing but a pair of boxers. It was nearing midnight and the fairy lights around the room were lit happily, but Owen didn't feel happy. How could he be? Claire had thundered out of their bedroom and straight into the bathroom, slamming the door behind her so loudly that the mirror on the wall opposite him had rattled. They hadn't fought like this before. It had been a week since the T-Rex had been 'destroyed' and Owen had expected Claire to talk to him about it. But she hadn't. She'd simply returned home the evening after it had happened, let him give her a hug though she didn't hug him back, and went upstairs to have a shower. He knew that shower had been a way for her to cry. He'd heard her. And his heart had broken, his arms still feeling empty from the lack of her affection. As the week had continued Owen had become more and more worried. More and more upset. To the point that all that remained now was frustration and confusion, and he wasn't able to take it any longer.

Owen walked into the bedroom to find Claire stood in front of the mirror, her body and face lit gently by the fairy lights that she must have turned on when she had come upstairs. She had gone up 'to bed' over an hour ago and he had decided to stay downstairs, unable to bear being with her in silence for another minute. She had stopped coming home at dusk at the beginning of the week and today he had decided to spend an extra hour in the raptor paddock instead of racing home to make her dinner. She hadn't been eating much anyway. There was a part of him that hoped she might get angry with him for not providing a meal, but she hadn't, instead opting to make a cup of tea in silence. When he had asked how her day had been she had just shrugged, telling him it had been much the same as all the other days this week.

Owen looked at Claire's reflection in the mirror. She was looking paler than normal, with dark circles under her eyes due to lack of nutrition and sleep. He saw that her hand was rubbing gently, slowly over her belly as she stood in a pair of his sweatpants and her own strappy top. His heart dropped as he saw her blank expression staring back at herself. But he could tell her mind was whirring.

Owen walked further into the bedroom, pulling his t-shirt over his head and dropping it onto the floor beside the bed. He pulled down his pants, leaving them on top of the t-shirt, then he paused in his boxers, his back to Claire who remained where she was. He felt so hopeless. He'd tried everything. He'd tried asking her how she was feeling. He'd tried asking about her days at work. He'd even checked her Amazon list and bought her three new books, trying desperately to find something to distract her from her thoughts. But nothing had worked. The books still lay, stacked one on top of each other on their chest of draws beside him. Exactly where she had left them two days ago after thanking him quietly with no smile. He was now feeling sick with worry. If she wasn't taking care of herself then she wasn't taking care of their baby. It was down to her to take care of their baby at the moment. To help it grow. To keep it safe. There was nothing he could do to contribute towards that other than to try to take care of her, but how could he if she didn't let him? It wasn't fair.

"Why won't you talk to me Claire?" he found himself asking. He'd asked her the same question the night she had come home after the T-Rex's demise. He sighed as he heard her open her mouth but no words came out, so he turned around. If she would just look at him then perhaps she might speak to him. But she didn't. She just stared at her reflection in the mirror. "Please! I need you to talk to me!" He noticed her expression wavered slightly, but it didn't reveal to him what she was thinking. He could feel his frustration rising. His patience was now wearing thin and his heart-rate began to increase. He raised his voice in desperation, "Claire please say something!" He reached out and held the top of her arm to turn her around, which she did whilst pulling away from his hand. She glared at him with her green eyes that glistened thanks to the light from the fairy lights in their bedroom. Her hand had left her belly and her arms stayed by her side. Owen didn't wait for the silence to continue. The house had been too quiet for too long. "I need you to say something! Anything!"

To his relief Claire opened her mouth, but the words that came out were of equal frustration and volume, "I don't have anything to say Owen!"

That wasn't exactly what Owen was expecting his girlfriend to say. It almost sounded alien to hear her voice, she hadn't spoken to him in so long. Normally he would be okay if someone chose not to speak to him. In the past he had once gone two weeks without talking to one of his raptor team because they had told him they didn't think he was training Blue correctly. Barry had once gone two days without talking to Owen, and Owen had been fine busying himself at work. To have Claire not talk to him had been torture, and he suspected it was because he loved her so much. So to have her say something now, even though it was yelled, made him feel slightly relieved. But no amount of relief could calm his voice as he continued to desperately make her understand how he was feeling.

"I can't stand being in this house while you refuse to talk to me!" he was still yelling in frustration, the big thought that had been eating him up over the past few days finally beginning to bubble over.

His heart dropped as Claire thrusted her head forward at him aggressively, barking her words at the top of her voice, each one stabbing him like a knife to the heart, "THEN GO, OWEN! IF YOU CAN'T STAND LIVING HERE THEN JUST LEAVE!"

And before he could say anything in response he watched the red head, her bare feet squeaking slightly on the wooden floor of their bedroom as she turned on the spot, storm out of the room. She had never yelled at him like that before. She had never walked away from him like that before. And she had certainly never walked out during a conversation before. Owen jumped as he heard Claire thunder into the bathroom and slam the door behind her. Suddenly a hush fell over the house as Owen took a deep breath, the memory of Claire's angry green eyes flashing in his mind. He unclenched his fists, having not realised that he had had them stuffed by his sides. He must have looked so threatening.

Owen's heart dropped as he heard a loud stifled sob come from the bathroom. Not being able to see her made hearing her cry even worse. He couldn't leave like she had angrily suggested. How could he? He was her boyfriend. The father of her baby. Her other half. He loved her more than anyone and anything in this whole world. He knew she was independent and head-strong, but he felt it was his responsibility to take care of her, to stand by her no matter what, even when she pushed him away.

Owen slowly walked towards the door of the bedroom and paused in the doorway, listening for any sounds coming from the door of the bathroom a few paces down the landing to his left. Nothing. If it hadn't been for the stifled sob he had heard a few minutes ago he would've presumed Claire wasn't crying. But he had heard it. She had sobbed. And Owen hung his head sadly, walking back to the bed and sitting on the edge of it. He would wait for her to come out, even if he waited all night.

Almost half an hour had passed and Owen still sat on the end of the bed. He hadn't cried, though he very nearly did whenever he thought back to the look on Claire's face as she'd looked at herself in the mirror. What had she been thinking? There was no way she had nothing to say, even though that had been all she had told him. There was something more but he had no idea what. A click was heard from the bathroom door as it opened gently, and the sound of bare feet pattered slowly down the landing towards the bedroom door. Owen saw Claire's shadow on the floor of the bedroom as she stopped in the doorway, and after a pause and a quiet sigh from the woman in front of him, he slowly raised his head from his hands to look at her.

The light from the landing behind her meant that not too much of her facial features could be seen in detail, but Owen knew her well enough to know what seemed different about his girlfriend. Her face was puffy from crying, but her cheeks were dry. He could see that she was holding a hand over her belly again, an action that made his heart ache longingly, desperate to be able to place a hand over her belly too.

"I'm sorry." He heard her croak, her voice quiet, tired, and unhappy. She didn't apologise often, and because of this her apologies meant so much more to Owen. He didn't like that she did things that she had to apologise for, but in this instant, from the moment she'd uttered the first letter of the first word he had already forgiven her. He sat up straight as he saw her reach to the wall beside her and switch off the landing light before stepping into their bedroom, closing the door behind her. Owen's heart still felt heavy. He watched her slowly walk over to the bed and sit beside him. He felt a spark as her leg ran alongside his. He noticed she sat with her hands in her lap, looking down at her fingers as she spoke quietly, "I haven't been fair on you this week. And to tell you to leave was just cruel. I didn't mean it."

Owen's heart was racing. Her voice sounded so sad, and he noticed tears were beginning to run down her face again. All he wanted was to make her smile again. To make her feel happy again. He watched her turn to him, and the moment her teary eyes met his he felt his heart melt, his breath catching in his lungs. She looked nervous, scared, and sad to have acted the way she had towards him. Her vulnerability made him love her even more. Yes she was independent and head-strong, and he loved her for it, but she also needed him, which he loved her even more for. "I love you." He heard her whisper to him. These were the only words he really needed to hear.

Owen leant over to Claire, bringing his lips straight down onto her mouth, and the moment he kissed her he immediately felt her arms wrap around his neck as she passionately kissed him back. The tears from Claire's cheeks mixed with their kisses, and Owen could hear his girlfriend let out a content little groan as his tongue slid into her mouth. Oh how he'd missed the feel of her lips on his, the feel of her tongue against his, the feel of her arms wrapped around his neck. He began breathing heavily as the couple kissed passionately, neither parting their lips as they made up for lost time. Owen felt Claire get onto her feet for a fleeting moment, but it was only to bring her leg over his legs so she could straddle his waist, and he brought his arms around her, grabbing her ass as their kissing intensified. Owen knew he should break the kiss. She had been so upset and she hadn't yet told him why she had been so distant, but for now Claire was in control of what was happening between them, and right now she was busy pulling her arms out of her strappy t-shirt. It seemed to help that Owen was already in a state of undress except for his boxers that all of a sudden seemed to be straining.

He felt Claire slide off his lap, their kiss breaking, and as Owen caught his breath he watched his girlfriend slide out of the pants she had been wearing. He'd be lying if he didn't say that he hadn't craved her intimacy this week, but she had neglected him for so long that it had got to the point that even a quick kiss would have been enough progress for him. The thought disappeared from his mind though as Claire pulled her strappy top over her head, resumed her position straddling his hips, then bent down and returned her mouth to his, kissing him firmly, her tears no longer present.


	21. Her Reflection & Thoughts Of The Future

Claire heaved a huge sigh as she lay her head in the nook of Owen's neck to her left. She felt him kiss the top of her head affectionately, his right arm lolled around her while she glazed her right hand over her belly, her fingertips lightly touching the skin. It had become a common action for her recently, especially since her pregnancy had been confirmed. She brought her left hand out to rest on Owen's stomach and he took it with his left hand, bringing it up to his lips to kiss before resting their hands on his chest. He had been so patient, and kind to her this week. She had been so horrible to him but she had finally told him everything she had been thinking and worrying about. And the moment she had she felt as though a weight had been lifted from her shoulders. He had been so understanding even when she had admitted at one point that she had blamed him in her head for getting her pregnant. It probably helped that she had told him everything after they had had sex. But because Owen was such a good man, she imagined that even if she had used more self-control and not succumbed to kissing him then he would have sat and listened anyway. Because he really did love her.

Claire tugged the door of the bathroom and let it slam loudly behind her. The noise rattled around the bathroom and she froze, her hands by her sides, as she saw her reflection under the glaring bright spotlights in the clean white room she was in. Her eyes were immediately drawn to her stomach. It hadn't been until this afternoon, when she had been walking past one of the restaurants to go into a meeting by the docks, that she noticed it. Her belly was beginning to grow. It was only the slightest bit bigger, not nearly enough for anybody that didn't know she was pregnant to notice. But Claire noticed. She brought her right hand up, slowly pulled the sweat pants she was wearing down so they sat just below her hips, and turned to her left, her eyes still on her belly. From this angle she looked nothing more than a bit bloated. As though she had just eaten a large Thanksgiving Day meal too quickly. Claire sighed, rubbing her belly thoughtfully with her right hand, then turning so she faced her reflection again. She looked up at her face. It was paler than normal, and beneath her eyes were dark circles that she hid with makeup during the day at work. Makeup was her saving grace at the moment. It made her staff believe that she was okay, but she really wasn't.

Claire quickly brought her hands up to her face and let out a large sob as she began crying. This wasn't her. All that she was right now was nothing like how she had been like in the years before moving back to the island. Before she had begun a relationship with Owen. She had been strong, independent, and so certain of her future. Now she felt weak, vulnerable, and terrified of her future. Claire continued to cry into her hands, though this time she cried silently. She was so, so exhausted! Her body ached all over, from her head to her toes. Her belly had got into a habit of feeling as though it had butterflies in it which, following a Google search, she had read that it was to do with the baby growing. This butterfly feeling didn't help when it happened in meetings, or when in the presence of her members of staff, because Claire wasn't able to place a hand on her stomach to gently try to massage the affected area. Doing so would raise suspicion.

Claire took a deep shuddering breath and brought her hands down from her face which had turned blotchy and red around her eyes and nose. She looked at her body, just as she had been doing in the bedroom earlier. It was as though the person she saw staring back was someone she didn't recognise. This blubbering mess wasn't the Claire Dearing she had always known. Sure, the first time she ever moved to Isla Nublar a few years ago she had often cried to herself about being alone, and how uncertain her personal life seemed. But she had been so sure of her professional life. She had been so sure that she would be running the park one day. And that certainty and confidence had been the essence of Claire's hard-working nature. That certainty had been everything to Claire. That certainty had been everything about Claire. Now there was so much uncertainty surrounded her career, and it was all thanks to this baby growing inside her. What would her bosses do the moment they found out she was pregnant?

Claire heard a tiny creak from outside the bathroom, and she turned her head to look at the bathroom door half expecting to see Owen try to open it. But after a moment of silence she realised that she had probably imagined the creak. That she had imagined it all, perhaps in the hope that Owen really would come into the bathroom. She resumed her attention back on her reflection and brought a hand up to her belly. It was his fault. He had done this to her. He had made her pregnant. And because he had made her pregnant, the T-Rex, her T-Rex had acted unusually affectionate towards her, drawing the attention of many staff members. Worst of all the dinosaur's behaviour had attracted the attention of The Board, who eventually gave the go-ahead for the T-Rex's termination. Her T-Rex had been destroyed all because Owen had made Claire pregnant. It was his fault.

Claire let out another sigh, her tears beginning to dry as she continued to rub her hand over her belly thoughtfully. It may not look like it from the outside but Claire could feel how much her body was changing on the inside. She sometimes felt sick. She had no appetite. Her belly would flutter and ache in a stretched-muscle kind of way. Her boobs felt sore from time to time, particularly in the morning. And now her belly was beginning to change. In a matter of months it would be much larger. Everything would change. Her mobility would be limited. She would never get comfortable in bed. Her clothes would stop fitting her. And worst of all her belly would be the first thing people would see. They wouldn't think about her position on the island, and how she was in charge of the park. They would see her as a vulnerable, pregnant woman whose hormones would undoubtedly affect her decisions and attitude.

Her attitude. Claire's heart fell as she thought back on the look on Owen's face when she had yelled at him earlier in the bedroom. She had been so awful to him this week. So distant and unaffectionate. She had subconsciously blamed him for the death of her T-Rex, when really it had been as much her fault as it had been his that she had got pregnant. It took two. He had done everything within his power to try to cheer her up, to get her to talk to him. But every night she had not wanted to speak. She had been too upset. Too exhausted. Too confused with all that was happening to her body at the moment that she struggled to put into words how she was feeling. So she had chosen to stay quiet. Better to say nothing at all than a little something that she may later regret. Though it appeared Owen hadn't felt the same way. His reaction this evening had been entirely understandable and Claire now felt terrible. The only person in the world who ever did everything in his power to make her happy was him. And she had not thanked him once. She had only ever taken it for granted.

Claire walked backwards, pulling the sweatpants up, and perched on the edge of the bath. She reached up and twirled a lock of her long red hair between her fingertips thoughtfully. Owen deserved so much better than her. He was kind, funny, protective, and affectionate. He wasn't afraid to express how much he loved her. And what did she do to thank him? To prove that she loved him too? Nothing. She had dismissed his warm arms this week. She had refused to talk to him. She had refused to reciprocate the vocalisation of her love for him. She did love him. More than any words could ever express. She had just really struggled this week to speak to anyone, especially him. She would use up all her words in meetings during the day, then run out by the evening. She had no way of telling Owen just how overwhelmed she was at the responsibility she had - to ensure that she grew his baby well. The responsibility felt like a huge cloud over her head. As the days had rolled by this week she had become more and more afraid. What if she did something to harm the baby? If anything happened she knew that Owen would never be able to forgive her. He would leave her. And as scary as her future seemed with a baby, it seemed far scarier without Owen by her side.

A lifetime had passed, or so it had felt, with Claire filling that time by just staring at her feet. Her hands. Around the bathroom. Thinking back on the first moment she had met Owen. To their first official date. To the first time she had seen him after their first date, two years later, before she took him to see the Indominous Rex. To the dramatic events during that day. Their first kiss, while fleeting, had been memorable too. Then the uncertainly of their future the moment they left the recovery hanger in Costa Rica. To the moment she had woken up in his arms later that day, in their hotel suite. She remembered how complete she had felt being with him. Happily looking into his arms while she gently stroked his cheek, before leaning towards him and placing a long soft kiss on his lips. The excitement she had felt when he had reciprocated the pressure of the kiss back to her.

Claire brought a hand to her mouth, as though she could still feel his kiss on her lips, even over a year later. Now here they were. Living together, back on Isla Nublar , preparing the island to be reopened. And they were expecting a baby. There was going to be a mini Owen or Claire racing around this house. Claire looked to her left at the bath she was perched on the edge of. This very bath would be the bath she would be bathing her child in this time next year. She envisioned a little boy or girl, with bright red hair, smiling back at her from its position in the bath, as Owen playfully splashed him or her gently from his position beside her. It was this vision that made Claire smile ever so slightly. He was going to be such a good father to her child. Her child. She was going to have a baby with him. And if she could have a baby with anyone she couldn't imagine any man better than Owen Grady.

Claire stood up, a hand over her belly as she thought about the little baby growing inside it and suddenly, for the first time this week, the clouds above her head seemed to part. She wasn't feeling terrified, or anxious. So long as Owen was with her everything would be okay. The thing was, she had treated him so badly that it was a wonder if he could ever forgive her. But the only way he could forgive her was if she apologised. She hated to do it. But if it was her only option then she would do it. So with a deep breath she made her way to the bathroom door and gently opened it. She half expected Owen to be sat on the landing, waiting for her, but he hadn't.

Claire slowly pattered down the landing in her bare feet, her hand still remaining on her stomach as she stroked it nervously. She paused in the doorway of her bedroom, her breath caught in her mouth as she saw her boyfriend sat with his head in his hands on the edge of the bed. Her heart lurched and she let out a quiet sigh. He looked like a broken man. As though he were confused and upset, and she hated that she had done that to him. It was nobody else's fault but her own. Her hand remained gently on her stomach, out of habit more than anything, and her heart ached further when she saw Owen raise his head to look at her. He looked so upset. She had to make things right again. She had to apologise. To tell him how much she loved him.

"I'm sorry." Claire croaked quietly. She hadn't spoken in so long. The light from the landing shone on his face, but she couldn't stand to see how unhappy she was making him. So she reached to her right and pushed the light switch on the wall, turning off the landing light. She stepped into the bedroom, closing the door behind her, then turned back to her boyfriend, who had sat up, his body now dimly lit by the fairy lights draped around the room. Claire slowly walked over to the bed. Her heart was racing. She didn't know why she was feeling so nervous. She sat beside Owen, her leg brushing his as she settled down on the mattress. She looked down at her hands in her lap, running through all the things she could possibly say to the man beside her. All she wanted to do was tell him over and over and over again how much she loved him. She could feel him looking at her, which made her more nervous, so nervous that she didn't immediately gush about her love for him, but more continued with her apology, "I haven't been fair on you this week. And to tell you to leave was just cruel. I didn't mean it."

Claire could feel tears begin to fall down her cheeks again. She was so exhausted. Exhausted from crying. Exhausted from not sleeping. Exhausted from worrying. She just needed him to take her in his arms and make her forget everything. Just for a moment. Just to let them be them again. "I love you." She finally said. She knew it wouldn't be enough. That she needed to say it again, and again, and again until the hurt she had placed on him could be healed. Claire felt Owen move towards her, and she turned to look at him. But before she saw his face properly she felt his lips land on hers, as though they whispered his forgiveness through their touch, and Claire clamped her eyes shut whilst bringing her arms around his neck. She hungrily, apologetically, passionately kissed him back, the taste of her tears in their kisses upping the couple's intensity as Owen wrapped his arms around her waist. A little content groan rumbled from the back of her throat as Owen slid his tongue into her mouth. That was the final straw. She had to get closer to him.

Claire tugged Owen's mouth harder against hers as she stood fleetingly, giving her the best angle to sling her right leg over his lap. She straddled his waist, allowing his arms to wrap their way around her waist again. She let out another small groan into his mouth as she felt his hands grab her ass and pull her closer to him. The past few days of no interaction, no affection, and no words were mostly the reason why the couple were now driving each other crazy as their bodies rocked together. Claire let her fingers ripple across his strong muscley back, over the old scars he had sustained over the years. She brought her arms back to her own body, allowing Owen to continue rocking her against him as she pulled her arms out of her strappy t-shirt, longing to also take her top off so their upper bodies had the chance to feel each other's skin. But it wasn't enough. She needed more. And so she slid off Owen's lap quickly, breaking their kiss. She immediately missed the feel of his mouth against hers and almost jumped straight back up onto his lap. But she resisted and instead quickly slid the sweatpants she had been wearing off over her hips, letting them pool down at her bare feet. She kept her eyes on her boyfriend, her body tingling with excitement as she pulled her strappy top off over her head, and dropped it down beside her. There was no pause. No wonder if perhaps they should talk before going much further. Claire's mind was on nothing but wrapping her body around the man before her, and letting him help her forget all of her troubles. She straddled his hips, took hold of his face with her hands, and pulled his lips to hers, kissing him passionately.

"You know I love you right?" she asked her boyfriend as she looked into his eyes. She saw him smile at her, and she immediately felt safe, and happy, and complete. Of course he knew.

"Of course I do." She heard him reply, and she smiled softly as she felt him kiss her forehead before continuing, "And you know that I love you too right?" and Claire smiled, biting her bottom lip as she nodded. She watched as Owen shuffled his body, bringing his face to her bare stomach, and spoke to it, "And I love you too little one." Claire tugged Owen back up beside her with a small giggle. Their baby was still a speck. There was no way it could hear anything, least of all the sound of its father's voice. Claire curled up beside her boyfriend, taking a deep, satisfied breath as she felt him glaze his fingertips on his right hand delicately across the long scar on her back. All of a sudden the exhaustion she had felt earlier covered her body again like a blanket, with her eyes feeling heavy. She closed them. Her hand rested upon Owen's chest and she felt it rise and fall at a steady rate as he glazed his left hand from her fingertips on his chest up to her elbow and back again. Suddenly life didn't seem so scary or complicated any more. He always seemed to have this way of calming her down. A small smile swept across Claire's mouth for a fleeting moment as she likened herself to one of Owen's raptors that needed to be tamed, then she quickly furrowed her brow. She didn't really like to compare herself with a dinosaur. An animal.

Her face relaxed again as she felt Owen sigh contently and she understood how content he felt because she felt it too. It wasn't long until 2016 was over. Then it would be 2017. The year when their lives would change forever. The year their child would be born. Whenever they saw that year written it would always be a special number to them. And June would be a special month. Her heart skipped a beat as she thought about all of the things they needed to do to get ready for the baby over the next seven months. They would go from being a couple to a family. A family of three. Claire, Owen, and their little baby Dearing-Grady. Time always went so quickly on this island, and before they knew it it would be the summer…


	22. The Crib & The T-Shirt

Owen wiped a bead of sweat from his brow as he twisted the final screw into the wooden frame before him. It didn't matter how much the wooden floors were supposed to make the rooms of their house cooler, by the time the end of spring rolled around on Isla Nublar their house was hot and humid thanks to the long days of hot sunshine and the humid atmosphere. Owen stood up straight, stepped back a pace, and placed his hands on his hips as he admired his handiwork. It had taken him forty minutes longer to put together this wooden crib than he had initially hoped, but it was together and now stood on the far right of the bedroom at the back of the house, beside one of the open windows. He had initially offered to build the crib himself from scratch, but his girlfriend had set her eyes on a crib online that they had eventually ordered. He wasn't going to argue with her, especially as she had spent several evenings across a few weeks meticulously scouring the reviews of every crib that was available that could be delivered to the island. Owen cocked his head slightly with a small furrow to his brow, trying to work out if the crib looked wonky, but after a few moments he shook his head and relaxed his expression. It would do for now. They still had six weeks to go until their baby was due.

Owen looked around the room, a small smile on his face. The once spare room was now a fully-fledged nursery. The two large windows in the room each had a blackout blind ready to block out the bright evening sunshine, however covering the black fabric of the blind was a pastel green fabric, to make to room feel more welcoming. On the right side of the room, just below one large window, stood the crib. On the left side of the room was the chest of draws Owen and Claire had bought together last year, which had a padded plastic changing mat on top that the expectant mother had ordered after much deliberation over the best one. She had eventually chosen that one because the delicate green swirls on a white background seemed to match the white/green theme the nursery was going for.

On each wall there were a set of two shelves, all of which had been sanded down by Owen and painted a pastel green colour. The two shelves above the draws and changing mat had stacks of diapers, wipes, powder and baby cream. The two on the wall by the door had story books displayed on them, the bright colourful covers standing out against the white painted walls. And the two shelves on the final wall were empty, except for a stuffed dinosaur on their surface. In fact on the end of each shelf stood a different stuffed dinosaur that Owen had had fun picking out one day whilst on a rare visit to the hub. Since the opening of the park a couple of weeks ago the whole of the south side of the island was a no-go area for the residents who lived on the northern side of the island unless they worked down there. Not as a rule, but more because it was common knowledge just how packed the park was during the daytime and often at night too.

While the crib stood under one of the large windows on the right side of the room, to the top-left of the room, underneath the other large window, stood a rocking chair which had a pastel green blanket draped over the back of it. Owen looked at it with a small smile and envisioned Claire sitting on it, rocking back and forth, while their child fell asleep in her arms peacefully. He couldn't believe that it was now only a matter of weeks until their baby would be here. He heard the sound of heavy breathing coming from the open bedroom door on the other side of the house and he smiled, pleased that his girlfriend was getting some well-earned sleep.

"Owen?" he heard the familiar sound of his girlfriend's voice echo upstairs to him from her position by the front door that she had just stepped through, her heels echoing with her as she presumably walked towards the staircase.

"Up here." Owen called back to her, his attention focused on the final three screws that lay on the wooden floor before him. He heard a clatter as she chucked her heels off her feet followed by the sound of her slowly make her way upstairs with a heavy sigh. Owen looked up from his kneeled position on the nursery floor to the top of the stairs, waiting for her appearance.

"Urgh, I've had such a busy day!" Owen couldn't help but smile at Claire's evaluation of how work had gone. She sounded exhausted, and the slow padding noise of her bare feet as she walked up the wooden stairs confirmed just how much she seemed to be struggling. The park had officially opened three weeks ago and was not only running smoothly but also appeared to be a huge hit. With the park reopened however, it meant that Claire's responsibilities had skyrocketed. Responsibilities that she had insisted she take on, even though she had been offered the help of an Assistant Manager that the board would hire to help take on some of the workload. An offer she had turned down. Owen watched as she appeared at the top of the stairs, a large hair clip in her hand, her long red hair lolling down her back. She wore white pants and a white jacket, but had a green blouse that, thanks to its light floaty fabric, seemed to hide how heavily pregnant she really was. Once at the top of the stairs the woman didn't stop, and instead turned to her left and made her way to the bedroom without looking over at the nursery, "I've got to lay down. Not having coffee is killing me" and Owen smiled as he watched his girlfriend shuffle towards their bedroom, peeling her jacket from around her body, and hanging it on the door handle absent minded. He heard her groan as, from the sounds of things, she took her trousers and probably her blouse off. The house was warm from the day's sun. Claire wasn't a big fan of being pregnant in her work suits, claiming they were too uncomfortable, and with this in mind Owen could hear her shrugging on a t-shirt that had become her favourite to lounge around in in recent weeks. She had initially scrunched her nose up when he'd given it to her, having got upset when all of his large t-shirts were becoming too tight for her. So Owen had gone out to buy a new much larger t-shirt. And the only place he could buy one? At one of the gift shops down the south of the island of course. With another, more relieved, groan Owen heard the sound of his girlfriend sinking happily onto the surface of their bed.

Owen made his way out of the nursery, pulling his vest over his head and wiping his face with it before dropping it into the wash basket that stood at the top of the stairs, ready to go down to the washing machine. Before turning right into the bathroom Owen pattered over to the door of his bedroom and leant against the door frame as he looked inside. There lay his girlfriend, tucked up in a foetal position as best as her pregnant belly would allow her. Her body now boasted a perfectly round and large bump, which she currently had her left hand resting over as she lay on her right side. Owen smiled as he saw the woman in a deep sleep, having returned home from work no more than fifteen minutes ago and he remembered the look on Claire's face when he had first given her that t-shirt a couple of weeks ago.

Owen heard Claire's voice call out to him from the bedroom. She sounded confused and slightly unimpressed, "Owen…what's this on the bed?"

Owen walked from the bathroom into the bedroom, pulling his toothbrush out of his mouth. She had asked him to get her a larger t-shirt to wear in the evenings when she got home from work, which he had obliged. The only problem was there weren't any places on the island that you could buy a t-shirt that wasn't dinosaur related. "It's the t-shirt you asked me to get" he answered innocently, though he grinned at her expression.

"Hatching soon?" Claire queried rhetorically, as she held the black t-shirt up in front of her eyes, reading the words on it then furrowing her brow at the cartoon baby dinosaur that sat in a cartoon hatched egg, smiling back at her from its position on the bottom middle of the t-shirt.

"Well would you rather I had got you a Jurassic World one?" he asked, before resuming the action of brushing his teeth. Her reaction to his question was predictable and she gave him an 'as if' look, before looking back at the t-shirt he had eventually chosen to buy her. As she continued to stare at it Owen continued, "Because they've got some great t-shirts with the logo at the front and the back?" He grinned as she turned back to look at him with her eyebrows raised, but her unimpressed expression waivered and she soon broke out into a small reluctant smile. Claire rolled her eyes with a sigh, chucked the t-shirt down on the bed, then proceeded to peel the blouse she was wearing over her bump then over her head. Owen watched, loving how beautiful his girlfriend looked even now her baby bump was certainly becoming sizable. He didn't care. Every time he looked at her, or remembered that she was carrying his baby, he felt his heart skip a beat slightly in excitement, proud to know that she was the one. Elated to know that there was no other woman in the world who would ever mean more to him than the woman stood before him now, who was hastily pulling the new t-shirt down over her belly in a stubborn fashion.

Owen watched Claire screw up her face slightly, bringing her hand up to the top of her bump and lightly rub in small circles on the surface. The baby was clearly digging into somewhere that was very uncomfortable. Looking at her now he still struggled to believe that inside her was his baby. Their baby. This little thing that would soon be out and in their arms, ready to greet the world. It hadn't gone unnoticed to the couple that their child was going to be the first little human born on this island. The first little human that they planned on protecting from the prying eyes of their co-workers and any media attention. They had arranged with Claire's doctor for a midwife to move into a spare house near theirs on the island for two weeks. A week before Claire's due date, and a week after, so that when the baby did decide to arrive the midwife would be on call and able to be on hand promptly. The Board had already asked Claire plenty of questions about her pregnancy, most of which she had refused to answer. She had wanted to make sure that her private life remained private.

Owen noticed Claire wince again, resuming the rubbing motion on her belly at a slightly different position. She then sighed and sat up, opening her eyes as she brought her legs around over the edge of the bed and stretching her back so she could sit up straight. She rubbed her eyes then looked over to Owen who gave her a sympathetic, almost apologetic smile. She smiled back at him, rolling her eyes with a slight shake of her head, before attempting to ease herself off the bed and to her feet. Owen strode forward, standing in front of her and holding his hands out. She took them, and stood up. Almost automatically Owen brought his hands to her belly, holding it on each side, and Claire placed her hands over his hands, her eyes boring into his with a smile. Owen smiled back and just as he did he felt their baby move in her belly, kicking back at his right hand. While it was now impossible to keep the fact that Claire was pregnant a secret, it wasn't impossible to keep the paternity of her child a secret. There were only nine people in the world, other than the couple themselves, who knew that Owen was the father of Claire's baby. Claire's sister and two nephews. Owen's mother, brother, and sister-in-law. Claire's doctor and midwife. And finally Owen's colleague and best friend, Barry.

"Oh. My. God." Owen furrowed his brow as Barry spoke, and he turned from the shocked look on Barry's face, over to the raptor office. His heart jumped into his throat as he saw the figure of his girlfriend peering through the window of the office, presumably looking to see if any of the raptor team were in the building. They weren't. They were all in and around the paddock. It was no surprise to Owen that Blue all of a sudden turned her attention from him up on the walkway of the paddock, over to the closed gate to her left, where she could see Claire turn and walk towards them. They had agreed that the red-head stay away from the paddock so no questions would be raised about the raptor's strange behaviour by the relatively new team that Owen had hired to help him and Barry train Blue, so she hadn't visited in about three months. Owen's heart began racing with pride and excitement as he saw his girlfriend pace across the ground, her bump noticeable despite her favourite blouse covering it. She had refused to buy maternity clothes, but now as she was fast approaching the seven month mark of her pregnancy, she may be left with little choice but to have to order some new clothes.

Her heels made a clanging sound as she made her way up the metal stairs of the paddock, which drew the attention of the six men in Owen's raptor team. None of them, except for Barry, knew that Claire and Owen were a couple. They only knew Claire as the top-boss. The boss who never hassled the team. Who never insisted they work to her tight standards that she was notorious at setting for all the other teams in the other departments of the park. It was once joked that the raptor team were her favourite team because she gave Owen, their boss, free range of anything to do with the last surviving raptor. Food, equipment, training… She never chased them up about anything. She never visited. In fact, if the team members hadn't been briefly introduced to her during their induction, they would have never known what she looked like. Yet here she was. Dressed in a long white skirt and suit jacket, with a bright blue blouse underneath. Her hair was tied up in a loose bun at the back of her head, and her lips boasted a bright red lipstick.

Owen stood up straight, turning towards Claire as she approached him and Barry. She looked calm, yet had a serious look on her face, though Owen knew it was just for show, to continue oozing authority to the other members of the team. She had spent many an evening telling him how much she hated that her staff were beginning to treat her a little differently since she had had to confirm that the rumour of her pregnancy (which had been spreading around the park like wildfire) was in fact true. Fortunately nobody had dared ask her who the father was, but she knew it was a hot topic being spoken about behind her back.

"Mr Grady, I thought I would come and see how you were progressing with the raptor." He noted her serious voice, but her eyes were locked with his and there was a twinkle in her eye that told him she was excited to see him. Excited to get to be near him at work, but having to play it cool in front of the raptor team who all stood at their different posts around the paddock, watching the interaction between the park manager and the chief raptor trainer.

Owen heard Barry pipe up beside him, "There's not a lot we can show you at this time of day. Blue has a strict routine and we've just finished another block of training." Owen could tell by the sound of his friend's voice that Barry was still rather shocked at seeing Claire pregnant. Any rumours of her pregnancy hadn't reached all the way out to the raptor paddock. Owen saw Claire give Barry a twitch of a grin, before turning on the spot and beginning to make her way back to the metal stairs whilst talking, "Then perhaps you will be able to show me the records you have of the training you do, and any other plans you may have for the future." Owen began to follow her, taking the fact that she hadn't said goodbye as a cue to join her, and he did so happily, with Barry walking beside him. As he followed the red head Owen could see his friend looking at him, but he refused to look back, not wanting to draw his team's attention further.

Once inside the office, Barry closed the door behind them, and Owen watched him turn to the couple with a big grin on his face. " You legend." The man said and went over to Owen with his hand held up for a high five, but before he reached the chief raptor trainer Claire's voice rang around the office, evidently unimpressed, " Er , excuse me!" and it was enough for Barry to stop in his tracks, his smile dropping as he looked at Claire. The woman had her hands on her hips and glared at the men. Owen had to hide his smirk as Claire began slowly walking towards them, "I would appreciate it if you didn't high-five Owen for this" she motioned to her belly as she scolded Barry, "and I would also appreciate it if you were discreet about it too."

Now Owen was smirking at his friend who was left lost for words as the woman stopped glaring at him, instead opting to look at him with a more serious expression. The man just nodded, and it was enough to make the woman take a deep breath, her face relaxing, "Thank you." she said calmly, before turning to Owen. He watched as his girlfriend released a small smile at the sight of his grin "Surprised to see me?" she asked and Owen's smile broadened, "You could say that" he replied giving her a wink that made the woman let out a small giggle before moving around to the large table in the centre of the room that had a couple of plans spread out on the surface, "Well I wasn't kidding when I said that I need to know what your progress is like. I need to feed back to The Board about Blue. They're starting to ask questions and I've run out of things to tell them that sound as though I legitimately come over here every week."

Owen felt a lump in his throat as Claire looked at the men, her smile having dropped from her face. He walked over to the table, pulling at the plans on the surface, and Barry stood to his right. "What do you want to know?" his friend asked, and Owen looked over at Claire who gave them a small shrug, "I spoke to them today, and I think they're starting to consider making Blue an asset again." she replied. Owen's heart sank as she stared at him with a small sad shake of her head, and she opened her mouth ready to continue but he had already interjected "What happened to not having any carnivores as part of the attractions? The park already has so much without Blue! When it opens next month the money will be flying in!" He realised his voice was sounding a little too harsh as he barked at her, his frustration beginning to bubble to the surface.

"I understand that Owen, but The Board seem to wonder why she's here if she's not making the park any money." Owen hung his head and he heard his girlfriend's voice get firmer, "This isn't what I'm saying, this is what they're saying."

"But Blue isn't ready to perform or do tricks. She's only just allowing Owen into the paddock with her!" Barry interjected, his voice also sounding firm, and the office fell silent as the trio stared at the plans on the table. Owen was the first to break the silence with the worry that was on the other's minds too, "What if she can't be trained? What if she can't perform?" He looked over at Claire who was staring at him, her eyes looking watery as she sadly shook her head. It was enough for Owen to know what she was saying. The Board would insist his raptor was destroyed, just like Claire's T-Rex had been. It was a thought that had never crossed his mind until now. He turned to Barry who looked down at the plans on the table in disappointment. It was thanks to this park, to working with the raptors, that the two had met five years ago. With no raptor to train or take care of, the two would surely have nowhere to work on the island. Owen had no fear of his future knowing it lay with Claire, on this island, with their child. But Barry, Owen had no idea what could be done for him if their final raptor was killed and the raptor programme was shut down. He would beg Claire to find his friend another position on the island of course and he knew she would do her very best to do so, but there was no guarantee she would be able to move Barry to a new department.

"Blue can't be destroyed" he said finally, and Owen saw Claire look at him with a determined expression on her face. "I know," she replied, "which is why I need you to tell me all that you can about how you're progressing with her. About your plans for her future. I need to know everything, then we can decide on what I tell The Board."

"I've finished the crib" Owen said softly, as he brought his hands down from Claire's bump, and he smiled as her face lit up.

"You have?" she asked, her voice sounding surprised, "When did you…?"

"This afternoon" He began, taking his girlfriend by the hand and leading her out of their bedroom, "I left Blue early so I'd have time to get it done before it got dark." He could feel Claire squeeze his hand in anticipation as they walked across the landing and through to the spare room that had now been transformed into a nursery. The bright late-afternoon sun shone through the windows and touched upon everything within the room, including the new crib to their right. He heard Claire let out a little gasp, and he watched as she slowly walked over to the piece of furniture he had spent the afternoon constructing. "What do you think?" he asked, his heart skipping for a moment in fear that she may not actually like it, despite having ordered it herself online. But his fear soon disappeared when he saw her turn to him with tears in her eyes, "I love it! It's perfect!" he heard her gush. He couldn't quite see how it was something to cry over, but wasn't unusual for Claire to get teary over things nowadays, something that she always blamed her hormones on. Before he knew it she had paced over to him, taken his head in her hands, and pulled him down to place a kiss on his lips, his torso pressed against her sizable baby bump as he placed his hands on her hips, happy that she was happy.


	23. Labour & Coming Home

p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"The day was drawing into early evening on Isla Nublar, and Claire Dearing reached into her handbag as the car she was in approached the front of her house. She frowned as her fingers wrapped around something small and plastic. She pulled it out and looked at it, a smile growing on her face as she saw the plastic brachiosaurus in her hand. It wasn't the first time she had found toys in her handbag and she knew it wouldn't be the last. Claire placed it back where she found it, and grabbed her purse, pulling out a fifty dollar note. She thanked her driver, handed him his tip, and eased out of the back of the car. As the sun's warm rays landed on her pale skin she smoothed down the back of her white suit with her right hand, her handbag hooked on her left arm at the elbow. Claire pushed through the small white wooden gate that Owen had pain-stakenly crafted and put up a couple of years ago, along with the small white picket fence that ran all around the length and width of their land. She paced along the path at the front of the house, up the three wooden steps to the wooden porch. She spied two pairs of very muddy shoes by the door. One very large pair, one very small pair and she grinned. Coming home was her favourite part of the style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"Claire felt the colour drain from her face as she froze, staring at her reflection in the mirror of the bathroom. Had her bump dropped? Was it lower? It certainly /span span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"looked/span span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" lower. She screwed her face up, wincing slightly and brought her hand to the bottom of her bump, a searing pain shooting from her stomach. She had been in pain on and off for several hours now and she had managed to ignore it during the long satellite meeting she had had with The Board earlier, but nothing compared to the pain she felt right now. Oh God. This was it. The baby was coming. At least, she thought it was coming. Claire scrambled out of the bathroom and paced as best as she could to her office a few doors away. Striding straight over to the phone on her desk she pressed a button that connected her immediately to the receptionist of the building, "Hannah I need a car to take me home /spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"now/span span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"." She normally waited to say thank you, but Claire had already slung her handbag over her arm and was on her way out of the door as the receptionist confirmed a car was ready./span span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"Claire paused at the elevator, waiting for it to arrive on her floor, and she winced again as the searing pain rocketed through her body. Her mind became scrambled as she desperately tried to remember everything her midwife had told her to do once she began to go into labour. She couldn't remember anything. Actually, tell a lie, all she could remember was that she needed to breathe steadily. And /span span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"so/span span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" as she stepped into the elevator and slammed her finger on the 'Ground Floor' button, she scrunched her face up, closed her eyes, and took deep breaths. She was trying not to panic, and all she could see in her mind as she kept her eyes closed was the cool calm face of Owen smiling reassuringly. She had to get home. She had to see him. She knew the moment she was with him that everything would be okay./span span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"The elevator pinged as it arrived on the ground floor and Claire waddled out into the reception area, her small heels clicking as she made her way to the reception desk. The receptionist, Hannah, took one look at her and her face dropped. The young woman looked terrified as Claire approached her, talking as calmly as she could possibly manage, "Listen, Hannah, I think I've gone into labour, so I need you to call the people on that list I gave you last week. Do you understand?" she watched as Hannah nodded, wheeling the chair she sat on over to a draw behind her, opening it, and tugging out a red piece of paper. On it was a list of seven names and contact numbers that Claire had compiled for her. They were all the people that the Park Manager was giving her responsibilities to whilst she was away for the week having her baby. As Hannah returned to her original position in front of Claire a loud trill sounded by the reception computer screen. It was the noise that sounded when a car had arrived to pick somebody up./span span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;""span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"This is your car Ms Dearing. Good luck." Hannah said professionally, but she shot the manager a reassuring smile in time for Claire to thank her, then dash out of the building as fast as she could without falling over. The driver had stepped out of the car, opening the door so Claire could ease herself into the vehicle. The moment the door closed behind her Claire could feel another sharp pain washing over her body. She felt like crying. But she didn't, and instead continued to take deep breaths. It would only take 30 minutes to get home. 30 minutes until she was with Owen. As the car pulled away from the house Claire took out her cell and called her boyfriend, who had actually finally invested in a cell for this very reason – for when she went into labour./spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;""span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"Claire?" she heard him ask the moment he answered the phone and immediately the sound her his voice calmed her./spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;""span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"Owen," she replied rather hurriedly, "the baby. I think the baby is coming." She winced again as she felt another contraction rush over her body. She noticed the driver had put his foot down a bit since her revelation as the car sped away from the hub of the park and over to the north-west of the island where she lived./spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;""span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"Shit. Okay. Where are you? I'm getting in my car. I'll drive to you!" Claire heard her boyfriend gush down the phone to her and she heard a car door slam on his end of the phone./spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;""span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"Owen I'm being driven back home as we speak." She hadn't meant for her voice to sound quite as panicky as it had, but the pain she was experiencing in intervals was fast becoming the worst pain she had ever felt, and she winced again, clenching her eyes shut and screwing her face up. It wasn't until she heard Owen calling out her name down the phone that she opened her eyes, sitting back and looking up at the roof of the car she sat in. She decided to focus on his words instead of the pain, though it was difficult when Owen didn't sound quite as confident as he usually did./spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;""span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"Claire, I'll meet you at home. I'll call Cassie to get the house ready." Claire had completely forgotten about her midwife for a moment. They had met the woman properly for the first time last week and she had immediately reminded Claire of her own mother. The woman was in her late fifties, quite large, wise, and had a no-nonsense approach when it came to telling Claire off for 'doing too much in her condition'. But it seemed that the midwife's sharp tongue mixed with a kind approach suited the red-head well, and within a matter of hours the two had seemed to hit it off, so much so that both Claire Owen felt confident that the moment their baby was ready to be born there was no safer pair of hands to deliver it than Cassie. "Claire, remember your breathing." The man said firmly down the phone and Claire took several steady deep breaths to compensate for the breath she hadn't realised she had been holding. "I should be home in ten minutes so I'll see you when you get back."/spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;""span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"Okay." Claire winced as another contraction rocketed through her body, and she let out a small yelp. She didn't notice her driver glancing at her through the rear-view mirror looking terrified. Nor did she notice that he had begun picking up the speed to get her home quicker./spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;""span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"I love you Claire." Claire took another deep breath as her boyfriend spoke to her, and she exhaled heavily, a small smile miraculously washing over her face as she processed his words, before replying back to him, "I love you too."/spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"Claire pushed open the front door to her house, stepping over the threshold and almost tripping over a helium balloon that had almost lost its air and now hovered a metre above the floor. It had taken her by surprise and she bent over, using the fingertips on her right hand to pluck the top of the dinosaur balloon that Owen's parent's had brought with them when they visited a few weeks ago. She had to hand it to the merchandise company, their helium balloons lasted a long time. Perhaps she should add that to the reviews she was having to write-up for the manufacturers of the park's products this week. Claire threw the balloon towards one of the sofas to her left, and it landed no further than a metre away from where she had thrown it. There seemed to still be enough air in it to keep it floating. The woman dropped her handbag on the floor by the door and paused, listening out for any noise, but there was nothing. No sounds. She furrowed her brow slightly and began walking from the front door, her heels echoing around the lounge as she walked along the wooden floor, stopping at the bottom of the stairs to listen out for any noises coming from the rooms at the top of the house. But there was style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"The lounge was no longer the empty crater it had once been when she had first moved into it almost eight years ago. It was actually relatively unrecognisable, what with all the handiwork Owen had done here and there. That was the beauty of having so much money, Claire could look things up online, spend her nights on Pinterest getting ideas on designs for all the rooms in the house and order items to be delivered to the island. And the beauty of having a boyfriend who was so keen on DIY was that he was always willing to put something together in the house and on the land they owned around their property. There were long pastel orange curtains that lay either side of the large windows that were only pulled together at night to keep the neighbours from looking in, though the nearest neighbours lived in a property opposite that would require binoculars to see the residents within. The far wall opposite the stairs had a large mirror stretching the length of half the wall, the space to the left of the mirror had a long fish tank that Owen had begged Claire to let him purchase a couple of years ago. Owen had made space for the tank on the wall, and had crafted shelves above and below it to provide additional storage. And she hated to admit it, but it made the lounge area feel more peaceful, even with the toys that were messily dotted around the floor of the room and that filled the large baskets on the bookshelf under the fish tank. In the corner of the room stood the TV that had come with the house, which was now turned on between 7am and 8am every morning, and 5pm-6pm each style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"Claire glanced towards the kitchen and noticed the back door was open. With a small smile she slowly walked over to it and stepped out onto the back porch. The sun settled on her pale skin again and she briefly closed her eyes as she felt it's warmth on her notoriously cool skin. The end of April always marked the best weather on the island. The days were still long and bright, the sun was hot but not it's hottest, and there was rarely any rain. Not even the tropical thunderstorms that normally rolled around in July/August. No, the weather was perfect. Particularly in the evenings. Claire quickly opened her eyes again as her ears picked up an excitable squeal that sounded from beyond the back garden of her house and her smile broadened. They were down at the style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p 


	24. Choosing a Surname & The Ginormous Fish

She stepped down the steps of the porch, being careful to avoid the small plastic cups, saucers, cutlery, and saucepans that were littered around the wooden floor. They all belonged to the large plastic kid's cooker that stood in the corner of the pavilion in the center of the garden, next to the fully-sized BBQ that Owen had updated the previous summer. Claire slid her heels off, knowing from experience that they sunk into the lush green lawn, and left them on the bottom step of the porch beside a half empty pack of kids multi-coloured chalks. She then made her way across the lawn towards the bottom of the garden, knowing that beyond the trees were the two people who meant the world to her. Her little family.

Claire lay motionless on the sofa in her lounge as Cassie busily cleared up any sign that the red-head had just given birth in the room. But Claire didn't notice the blood on the sheet on the floor. She didn't notice the smell. She could only just sense that Owen knelt on the floor beside her, his right arm wrapped around her shoulder. All of her senses. All of her emotions. All of her being was focused on the tiny little human wrapped in a large cosy blanket that lay in her arms. Her little human. Their little human. Their little boy, who clenched his tiny hand around Owen's little finger. Tears began rolling down Claire's cheeks again. She couldn't stop staring at him. He was so beautiful and handsome and gorgeous and her heart ached because of all the love it had for this tiny little thing. And he just lay there, mumbling softly, letting out the odd squeak before opening his little eyes, then closing them again. With every squeak Claire would giggle through her tears and her heart would skip a happy beat as she would hear Owen chuckle too. She could tell he couldn't keep his eyes off their son either. Their son. They had a son. She had just given birth to a baby boy. She had just given Owen a son! And there was no denying he was Owen's son. The tiny baby was the spitting image of his father already and it filled Claire with pride. It was hard to tell what colour eyes he had yet as she had been told several times by Cassie that it would take a few days before his official eye colour became apparent, but one thing was certain, her son hadn't inherited her ginger hair. She had cried with joy when she'd noticed a layer of thin blonde hair on top of her baby's head. He wouldn't get bullied for his hair growing up. That was one less thing she had to worry about. Claire sighed a happy heavy sigh and felt Owen kiss her head. She finally wrenched her eyes from her baby in her arms and looked at her boyfriend beside her, his eyes watery and bloodshot from all the crying he had done the moment their son had been born. Claire smiled at him and he looked back at her, a smile on his face too. "I'm so proud of you" she heard him whisper and she continued to smile as she thanked him. She watched as he leant over to her and placed a soft kiss on her lips, her tears mixing with his. This was it. This was what it felt like to have everything in life. This is what being complete felt like. And Claire never, ever wanted to let it go. Her son let out another squeak and the couple parted to look back down at their baby.

"Tea." Claire heard Cassie say as the woman bustled over to them holding two mugs of hot tea in her hands. She placed them on the coffee table that she had moved back into place while the couple had been cooing over their new-born. Claire smiled in thanks, thanks for the coffee and for helping her through the relatively short labour. She couldn't believe she had given birth to a baby in her house. "I just need to fill out some paperwork then I'll get it all sent off to the medical centre over in Rica to be processed" and Claire and Owen both nodded their permission as the midwife pulled out a massive folder and began filling in a document.

"So this handsome fella is going to be called…Nathaniel…"the woman said slowly as she wrote it out on the paper in front of her. The more Claire heard the name the more she loved it. It wasn't a name she heard much anymore, but it had been her father's name. Known to his friends and family as Nate, but Nathaniel at birth. "…Johnny…" named after Owen's brother who had died when he had been a child. Owen had been insistent that their son have his brother's name somewhere within his own name and Claire had been more than happy for that to happen. It seemed only right. "Grady? Or Dearing? Or Dearing-Grady?" the couple took a deep breath for a moment, until Cassie looked up at them with a smile, "This is the part where most couples disagree so take your time."

Claire held her breath. When growing up she had imagined that if she were to have any children they would have her husband's surname. But she and Owen weren't married. Claire had spent the whole of her pregnancy calling their son 'Mini Dearing-Grady' to herself, despite having always felt how unnecessary a double-barrelled surname was. It sounded silly at the end of children's names. In fact it sounded silly at the end of any names. And Nathaniel Johnny Dearing-Grady sounded ridiculous. It would be selfish of her to insist that Nathaniel have her surname, and what if she and Owen did one day get married? Then their son would have a different surname to them. Claire looked over at Owen who was already looking at her in concern, trying to read her mind, and she gave him a reassuring smile, keeping her eyes on him as she spoke softly yet confidently, "Grady. Nathaniel Johnny Grady."

Claire pushed herself past the final tree and the view before her opened up to the wide ocean and a set of wooden steps that led down to the little cove at the back of their land. And down in the cove, stood side-by-side, with the ocean gently lapping at their bare feet, stood Owen and Nathaniel. The little boy with bright blonde hair jumped up and down, letting out another squeal of delight as he watched his father reel in a large fish on his fishing line. Claire continued to smile as she made her way down the steps, trying her hardest to keep herself from dashing over to them, the sight of them being something she wanted to treasure as a memory forever. She watched as Nathaniel wandered towards a large yellow bucket next to Owen, crouching down and hold the edges of it, presumably to keep it steady for his father. "Don't move the bucket Nate" she heard Owen call out to Nathaniel and the little boy looked up at him, his little eyebrows raised, just like his mother did, as he spoke seriously in his little voice "I wasn't moving it Daddy, I was just holding it. Like this, see? Daddy? Daddy! I'm just holding it like this" and the little boy motioned to his hands on the edge of the bucket as his father looked down at him with a grin, "Good job son. Are you ready?" But the little boy hadn't heard his father because he was too busy looking over towards the wooden steps. Claire's heart soared. No sooner had she reached the bottom of the steps, her feet lightly sinking into the warm sand of the cove, her son had spotted her and her heart skipped a beat as she heard him squeal her name excitably "Mommy!"

Claire smiled as she watched her almost-three year old son race as fast as he could across the soft sand towards her, his face boasting a broad grin, and she crouched down with her arms open wide. She felt his small body thud against hers, his little arms wrapping around her neck and squeezing her tight as she pulled him into a giant hug. "I missed you" she said to him softly and her son kept his arms around her as he told her he had missed her too. She felt his right hand delicately pulling at her red hair that ran just below her shoulders like he had done when he had been ready for a nap or to go to sleep as a toddler.

But before she could reminisce about those days her son pushed against the front of her shoulders to look at her and she couldn't help but smile at how excited he looked, "Mommy I caught a fish today!"

Claire over-compensated a surprised look on her face, "You did?" and she let out a giggle as her little boy nodded enthusiastically before wriggling out of her grip. She bent down to place him back on the sand, and Nathaniel immediately brought his hand up to guide her over to the gentle waves where his father stood.

"I did! I caught it all by myself! I was stood over here and Daddy was stood there and I was stood for such a long time and then I caught one!" Claire giggled again as her son spoke animatedly in his odd little accent. She and Owen still found it funny. Nathaniel seemed to speak with the laid-back Californian accent of his father, but with some words that had a New York twang to them, like his mother. And he talked so much! She remembered how excited they had been when he had said his first word. Now they often collapsed on the couch once they had put him to bed, relieved for the peace and quiet. But they wouldn't change him for the world.

Claire felt her son drop her hand as they approached the water and run over to Owen who had just drawn in another large fish and was in the process of untangling the hook from the animal's mouth. They were in for a good dinner tonight. "Don't worry Daddy, I'm back" said Nathaniel, who made his way over to the bucket beside Owen, and Claire grinned as she watched her son resume his crouching position with his hands holding the edge of the yellow bucket. "Phew. I was getting worried you'd left me alone to tackle this ginormous fish alone!" Owen had replied, and Claire watched her boyfriend pretend to struggle with the large fish that was almost the length of their son. Nathaniel laughed a loud gurgling laugh as his father messed about then placed the fish in the bucket, "Daddy, I didn't leave you! I just went to get Mommy!"

Claire was giggling as she looked at the state of her messy boys. Nathaniel wore a pair of cargo pants that were once a beige colour, along with a bright green t-shirt that brought out his green eyes which he had inherited from her. Emblazoned on the back of the t-shirt was the Jurassic World logo and on the front was the phrase 'My Daddy's the Raptor Trainer' in bold black letters, a t-shirt that Claire's sister had had made for Nathaniel for Christmas. He also had a bright blue t-shirt of the same design with the words 'My Mommy's the Park Manager' on the front. The once clean clothes that Claire had put him in before going out to work that morning now boasted muddy stains all over. It wasn't unusual for her over-active hurricane of a son to be scruffy from head to foot and she had been pre-warned during her son's early months by Owen's mother that Nathaniel would be just like his father, who had rarely stopped his whole childhood. And she hadn't been wrong.

"Welcome home Mommy" Owen said.

Claire saw her boyfriend walking over to her with a cheeky grin on his face and her smile dropped. She held her finger out as a warning, "Don't come near me with those hands." But he didn't listen to her, instead choosing to move quicker towards her, "Owen, I mean it! This outfit is white!" she had raised her voice, not meaning to make it sound as shrill as it was. Her boyfriend was as filthy as her son and she could only presume he had been teaching Nathaniel wrestling techniques at some point this afternoon. He was covered in mud, not to mention the smell of fish all over his hands after the fish he had been tackling into the bucket for their dinner. To her surprise he stopped, his eyebrows raised as he motioned to her outfit, "It doesn't look very white to me…" and she glanced down at her outfit, sighing hopelessly as she noticed muddy sandy stains up her legs, and down her strappy top. Clearly her son's feet had smothered her clothes in mud when he had scrambled to cuddle her a moment ago. Claire gasped and let out a loud squeal as she felt Owen grab her and sling her over his shoulder, much to their son's delight who laughed loudly as he watched his father carrying his mother along the sand towards the sea.

Claire squealed again, "Owen no! Put me down!" Her stomach dropped as she saw his feet wade into the water then stop, "Put you down in the water?" she heard him ask. "No. No not here. Put me down over there!" but despite her bossy tone she continued to giggle as Owen just took a couple of paces to his right, remaining ankle-deep in the ocean water, "Over here?" and Claire just giggled bringing her hand to her face to pull her hair up from over her eyes, looking across at her son who still laughed loudly from his position beside the yellow bucket. She hated getting her work clothes messy. It would mean having to send them off to be dry-cleaned which was always a faff because they had to be shipped across to Isla Nublar. But then her current outfit was already dirty. If anything the sea water would help. And all of a sudden Owen swung her off his shoulder, letting her feet land with a splash in front of him. She laughed, he laughed, their son laughed. Sure his hands smelt awful, but to the credit of Owen he kept his hands on her hips and Claire reached up, taking his face in her hands, and pulling him into a deep kiss.

Suddenly their lips separated as they heard their son yell to them in his little Californian/New York accent "Wait for me! I'm coming too!" to which the couple immediately parted, yelling "No!" in unison, before dashing towards Nathaniel who had already reached the water and was attempting to wade his way over to them. Their little rascal.


	25. First Steps & Her Mannerisms

Owen scooped up their son as Nathaniel, who was too giddy at the idea of running into the calm warm ocean water to join his parents, fell over with a loud splash. That was the thing about Nathaniel, he had no fear except that if he saw something that fascinated him then he wanted to be a part of it and get involved. That was why he had begun to run towards his parents as they stood several metres into the ocean. It wasn't so deep to the adults, but it would have reached just above Nathaniel's knees if he had made it to them. Luckily his father had rushed over to him in time. Though not in enough time to stop the little boy from falling over. There was once a time, when the young Grady had been a baby, that whenever he was scared or hurt he would immediately insist that his mother comfort him, and for the times that he did get scared or hurt while Claire was around she would comfort him right away, holding him tight in her arms and rocking him back and forth with a steady hushing sound. But nowadays Nathaniel was tumbling over or falling off things so frequently that his father had taught him to get straight up, dust himself off and, if his father was nearby, give him a high five for bravery. Claire was still protective of her little boy though, and the moment she arrived beside Owen, she plucked their son out of his arms and placed him on her hip, trying (and failing) to rub down the soggy sand from Nathaniel's front.

"Right, we'd better get back to the house." Owen heard his girlfriend say to their son as they walked out of the ocean and over to the yellow bucket that boasted three large fish, her voice wavering slightly and he understood why. She was always terrified something terrible might happen to their son because he was always so adventurous. Their almost-three year old had always been fearless, adventurous, and curious. Owen remembered the moment Nathaniel took his first step. It had fortunately fallen on a Sunday, the only day that Claire took off from all responsibilities and let her second in command be in charge of the park. Sunday's were the day that Claire switched her cell off, and instead left the house phone as an option for her colleagues to ring if they needed her in an emergency. Claire's second in command, Melanie, was highly organised, confident, and competent. This meant that Claire was never stressed on her day off. Except for that day their son took his first step.

Owen switched the shower off, stepping out onto the soft rug on the bathroom floor and reached out for one of the large white towels on the towel rack before wrapping it around his wet body. He had just been for a refreshing early morning run and his shower immediately following was one of his favourite parts of the day. One of them. It was a time to mentally prepare himself for the day ahead while he let his girlfriend sprawl out in their king-size bed on her day off. He'd snuck straight into the bathroom following his run, being careful not to wake his son who somehow had a super-human sense of hearing. Waking his son whilst in the shower would mean that Claire would have to get up to tend to their one year old, who seemed to have all the energy in the world the moment he woke up in the morning. One thing was for sure, putting black-out-blinds in Nathaniel's bedroom when they were decorating it had been one of the best decisions they had ever made. No light entered that room, which meant Nathaniel would normally wake around 8am on a Sunday morning as neither Claire nor Owen had work, giving them the opportunity for a lay-in.

Owen gently crept across the floorboards of the bathroom, screwing his face up as he ever-so delicately twisted the handle of the bathroom door and opened it, stepping out onto the landing. He decided against closing the door behind him for fear that it may be enough to wake the sleeping baby in the house and instead crept through to his bedroom. A few silent paces in and he froze. He looked over at the bed and there lay his girlfriend, dressed in her pyjama short-shorts and strappy top, laying on her right side, fast asleep. Her right arm lay outstretched along the mattress as her long red hair was tied up in a messy bun at the back of her head. And curled up beside her, his face nestled into her bosom as he slept, was their son. Nathaniel had turned one a few weeks ago. A relatively quiet affair. Well, quiet meaning it had just been the three of them. Their little boy was far from quiet though. He chatted away to himself, to either of his parents, or even both of them together, all in his own jumbled baby jargon. They couldn't wait for him to talk properly.

Owen had to admit it was both wonderful and unusual to see his son so quiet. And still. And peaceful. He hoped he hadn't woken the little boy up, but regardless it looked like at some point between him leaving the room to go on his run and him returning from the bathroom Claire had got up to bring their baby into bed with her. For someone who had claimed she had no idea how to be a mother and how terrified she was that she would mess things up, she was doing a fantastic job. Owen wondered if he could somehow crawl back into bed, curl up behind Claire, and enjoy the peaceful Sunday morning as a little calm family. But as he stepped closer to the bed his foot fell onto a book that had buttons on it. Each time the button was pressed it would make a loud sound. The second Owen felt the book beneath his right foot his heart fell and he hung his head in disappointment as the book of farm animals made a loud ' moooooo ' noise. The man froze, hoping it hadn't woken either member of his little family laying before him. He noticed Nathaniel stir and he held his breath. The baby, however, simply brought his head away from his mother's bosom, rubbed his right eye sleepily with his right fist, and then with a heavy sigh resumed his snoozing position. Owen let out a sigh of relief, stepping off the book.

"If he wakes up again in the next ten minutes you'll be the one taking him downstairs." He heard his girlfriend mumble sleepily. She sounded unimpressed by his noisy entrance and he didn't blame her. They were finally beginning to have longer blocks of sleep overnight between Nathaniel waking up and crying, but he still took a long time to get to sleep in the evenings and woke a good three or four times in the night because the atmosphere on the island was so muggy. The couple took it in turns to go into the nursery and try to calm their son if he cried, though normally all it took was for Nathaniel to mumble through the baby monitor in his sleep before Claire wanted to get up and sit in the rocking chair beside his cot. The past few nights Owen had managed to persuade her to stay in bed and only go to their son if he cried. Which she had done. And it seemed to work. She appeared to be better rested. For now.

"Deal" Owen whispered back to Claire and he noticed a smile spread across her face as she turned to look at him. Owen motioned to their son, then put his thumbs up, and she let out a short burst of breath as a form of silent giggle, before rolling her eyes and turning back to the baby in her arms. Owen watched as his girlfriend brought up her left hand that had been perfectly sat around their baby boy's diaper-clad bottom, and glazed her fingertip delicately over Nathaniel's soft right arm. She was made to be a mother. No matter what she had said in the past, motherhood suited her. Owen crept around to his side of the bed, letting the towel drop from his dry body, and eased his way into the bed, pulling the covers over himself. He leant over Claire's shoulder to look down at their sleeping son with a smile. His girlfriend turned her head to look up at him with a sleepy smile, and he bent down to place a kiss on her lips. He lingered his mouth against hers for longer than he had first expected to and he felt Claire pursue the kiss further, leaning into him as best she could, and before long their kiss had deepened. Owen shifted his body weight to get into a better angle for the kiss but in doing so nudged Claire's body, which nudged their baby's body. The couple froze and Owen heard Claire sigh as their son let out a groggy whine before waking up. The silence was broken. The father didn't wait for any instructions from the mother, he knew what was required of him, and so he rolled out of bed, slipped on some sweatpants, and wandered around to the other side of the bed.

"Come on Monkey," he said, scooping his son up from Claire's arms, "we need to give Mommy a rest" and Owen bent down to give his girlfriend a kiss, leant Nathaniel down so she could place a kiss on his cheek, then stood up straight again. He let out a small chuckle as he watched Claire collapse back in the bed with a sleepy, grateful grin on her face, and Owen began making his way out of the room. The baby however wriggled so much in his father's arms that Owen was left with no choice but to place his son down on the laminate floor of the bedroom by the door. The man started to make his way over to the stair-gate at the top of the stairs, expecting to hear the squeak of his son's knees on the laminate floor as Nathaniel crawled after him across the landing. That was normally the little Grady's move. But Owen turned with a gentle frown as he heard a small gasp sound from Claire. He noticed she had sat up in bed looking through the open door and a few metres before him, stood on his own two feet and about one footstep away from the bedroom doorframe, was Nathaniel. The baby wobbled on his legs, keeping his left hand on the doorframe, his right arm held out to help keep his balance, but he was standing. All on his own! Owen grinned as his son looked over at him longingly with a big smile over his face, so the father knelt down on one knee and held his arms out, "Come on Nate". The baby wobbled on his legs excitably to see his father at eye-level, but he heard his mother shuffling on the bed behind him to get a better view, pulled his left hand away from the door as he turned to look at her and lost his balance. He fell with a loud slap, as he fell face first onto the floorboards of the landing, and Owen immediately dove forward to scoop their crying son up while Claire jumped out of bed to join them.

It still hurt a bit inside when his one year old son chose Claire over him in most given situations, particularly if he was scared or, like now, hurt, and Owen reluctantly handed his son over to Claire who had joined them on the floor of the doorway because Nathaniel, who was crying, had immediately struggled in his father's arms to get over to his mother. Owen watched as his girlfriend rocked their son, hushing the baby soothingly until he stopped crying. It didn't matter how much it hurt him inside, it still gave him a wave of pride to see how good she was with their son. And besides, since returning to work eight months ago, following a much longer stint of maternity leave than she had first planned during her pregnancy, Claire didn't get to see as much of her son as Owen knew that she wanted to. She was the boss yes, and she created her own working pattern, but it was because she was the boss that she needed to be present within the working areas of the island. It didn't stop her coming home at 5pm most days though. And by then Owen had had a long enough day with his exhausting baby son that it was always a relief to see her walk through the door.

Nathaniel stopped crying, was still curled up in his mother's arms, and had managed to grab a loose lock of her red hair that had escaped the messy bun on her head. The baby squeezed the lock between his fingers as a form of comfort while his mother pushed back his soft blonde hair that had grown a fair bit in recent months. Owen noticed a large red mark on his son's forehead and figured he'd bumped it on the floor when he had fallen. He heard Claire let out a little disappointed groan and knew she had spotted the bump too. "Naaaate !" she exclaimed under her breath as she inspected the bump closely. Their baby just looked up at his mother with his big green eyes, and a big grin grew on his face which was enough for his parents to each let out a giggle.

Owen bent down to pick the large yellow bucket up, brought his right arm around Claire's waist, and the little family walked across the sand together with smiles on their faces whilst caked in mud and ocean water. Suddenly Nathaniel wriggled, exclaiming that he wanted to get down and walk. Despite Claire's best efforts to keep hold of him the little boy was having none of it and eventually the woman was left with no choice but to stop and put him back down on the sand, whilst telling him to walk alongside them. But their son had ignored his mother, and ran around her, behind his parents, and to the other side of his father. His little hands took hold of a spare bit of the bucket handle, "I'll help!" he squeaked and Owen sighed. If the three year old helped it would take them ages to get back up to the house and Owen needed to prepare the fish and fire up the BBQ.

"Nate, Daddy needs to carry the bucket on his own," he heard his girlfriend say to his right, but their son kept hold of the bucket handle while they walked, "Nate are you listening to me?" Owen looked down at his little boy who maintained his concentration on the fish in the bucket he was helping to carry whilst his mother's tone became more threatening, "Nathaniel!" the couple stopped and looked down at their son who was looking up at them with a frown on his face, but his mother continued talking to him, "The bucket is too heavy so let Daddy carry it on his own!" Owen hid his smirk as he saw the blonde boy let go of the bucket handle and place his little hands on his hips instead. It didn't matter how much his son looked like him, so many of his mannerisms were Claire's. He was determined and often stubborn and hated not getting his own way, much like his mother. But Owen wasn't sure where Nathaniel had picked up the hands-on-hips thing as Claire rarely had a reason to get angry about anything at home - he was left with the only other option which was perhaps the almost-three year old had noticed his mother do it when she took him into the office with her on Thursday's. So the little blonde boy stood with his hands on his hips, staring up at them with his big green eyes, his freckles covering the skin around the top of his cheeks and nose, and he raised his little eyebrows, "If the bucket is that heavy Mommy then Daddy really needs my help."

Owen couldn't hold back his smirk any longer and he felt his girlfriend sigh by his side. She knew their son had won this argument, and Owen knew she was too tired to fight it out, so the red head looked up at him and he looked down at their son with a smile, "Come on then" and the little boy grinned back at his father, taking hold of the handle again, while Owen bent down to his left slightly so it made it easier for his son to 'help'. The family began slowly walking towards the wooden steps of the cove that would lead them up to their back garden.

"See, I was only trying to help, wasn't I Daddy!" he heard Nathaniel pipe up as the little boy screwed his face, pretending to work really hard at helping to carry the bucket, and Owen shot a grin at Claire who shook her head slightly with a relaxed smile. He knew she hated losing arguments, but there was only one person in the world who she easily surrendered to, and that was their son.


	26. The Race & Bathtime

The rays from the early evening sun was still drenching the back garden in light and Claire perched up on the toes of her bare feet to plant a quick kiss on Owen's lips, a yelp sounding from the back of her throat as he gave her ass an affectionate slap, and she grinned as she parted from him. Their son had already ran off into the house the moment his mother had told him he needed to have a bath before dinner. "See you in a bit" Claire said to her boyfriend, who shot her a wink and a grin as he stepped over to the large BBQ beside him and began lighting it. Claire stepped down off the pavilion and walked across the soft green grass of their back lawn towards their house. As she approached the wooden porch she bent over to pick up her pristine white heels from the bottom step, and let out a small giggle as she heard Owen wolf whistle at her from his position on the pavilion. She shook her head slightly as she pattered her way up the wooden steps and along the patio, taking a quick glance back at him, noticing him watching her as she approached the back door of the house.

The silent house behind her was suddenly disturbed by a little voice that echoed loudly from the foot of the staircase through to the kitchen, "aaaaaahhhhhhhh!" and Claire turned to see her noisy son stop in the middle of the kitchen with an excitable grin on his mucky face. She couldn't help but let out a giggle as she noticed Nathaniel had stripped so he was in nothing more than his underwear, "Mommy I'm ready for my bath!"

"So I see" the red head replied, her fingers still gripping her heels, "go on then" and she watched as her son jumped excitably, turned on his bare feet, and ran full speed out of the kitchen towards the staircase yelling "I'll race you!" It was all about racing with Nathaniel. Christmas last year had been when the racing started.

The sun was raging down on Isla Nublar but the Christmas music still echoed around the house. Claire was stood in the kitchen with her sister Karen, Owen's mother Elizabeth, and Owen's sister-in-law Emma. The four women were smiling at each other while they overheard their respective partners out on the back porch trying to get Nathaniel to put his little trainers on, "Come on son, just put your trainers on then we can go for a walk" Claire heard Owen plead with the two year old , and she peered out of the open kitchen door out onto the porch where her son stood with his arms folded and his back to the house, looking up at his father, his two uncles, and his grandfather. All the men looked down at the little rascal, running out of suggestions on how to possibly get him to put his trainers on. Claire grinned, knowing that her son hated wearing anything on his feet. The only days he really had to wear shoes was when he was out of the house on a Monday when he went to playschool, a Thursday when she took him into work with her, or a Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday when Owen took him into work with him. The rest of the time Nathaniel's parents let him run around in bare feet. Claire & Owen had had that routine in place from the moment Claire had returned to work full time when Nathaniel had only been four months old. It may be Christmas Day, but the littlest Grady wasn't stupid. He knew that yesterday had been Friday, the last day that he had to accompany his father into work, the last day of the week that he had to wear shoes.

"No! No shoes!" the two year old piped up. The men stood in front of him sighed, their patience being seriously tested, much to the amusement of the women stood in the kitchen. Nathaniel was the first grandchild for Owen's parents, and he was adored by all members of the Grady family, which meant he got away with a lot whenever he saw them. But Owen wanted to take everyone to the raptor paddock this afternoon to introduce them to Blue, who he had of course told them so much about, and going there meant that Nate Grady needed to put his shoes on.

"Nate if you don't put your shoes on you won't be able to go with us to Daddy's work" Jim, Owen's father, said kindly with a hint of desperation in his voice. Claire watched the older man crouch down to his grandson's level, but the blonde boy shook his head, tightening his crossed arms.

"Come on Nate, I really want to see Daddy's dinosaur!" Owen's brother begged, making his voice extra winey, hoping that it would be enough to make the young Grady back down and agree to put his trainers on. But Nathaniel still stood stubbornly in front of his trainers, refusing to put them on. Jim stood up straight with a sigh.

After a long pause, the final male adult stood in front of Nathaniel slipped his own trainers off and pushed them in front of himself, opposite the little boy's trainers. The two year old looked down at the trainers, then up at the trainer's owner, Karen's fiancé Michael. Karen had met Michael at a friend's party four weeks after her divorce had been finalised. Now almost three years on and here they were, celebrating Christmas together just off the coast of Costa Rica with Karen's only remaining blood family member other than her two sons, who were both spending Christmas with their father this year. The moment Claire had met him she immediately liked him. He was far better for her older sister than her ex-husband had been. And the moment Michael had met Owen the two men had hit it off, much to the sister's delight. Nathaniel had never known a time when his Uncle Mike hadn't been around, having only been two months old when he had first met him.

"Okay Nate, how about I race you?" Claire heard Michael say to her son, and it appeared to have caught the little boy's attention as Nathaniel had dropped his arms to his side curiously. "First one to get his trainers on wins. Ready…steady…" but before the man could say 'go' the two year old had dashed down, grabbed his trainers, and began stuffing them on his feet, pulling at the Velcro fastenings while Michael pretended to really struggle to get his own trainers on.

Claire looked over at Karen who was busy watching the scene with a smile on her face. Nathaniel squealed in excitement as he stood up with his trainers on his feet, and Michael pretended to groan in disappointment. "I win I win!" she heard her son exclaim as he held his arms up in the air in celebration. The men cheered the little boy, high fiving him in turn, and the women in the kitchen laughed.

Claire made her way from the bathroom, having begun running her son's bath, through to his bedroom. She picked up his filthy clothes from the busy day he had had with his father, groaning slightly as she realised just how muddy they were. They were going to be a nightmare to wash, especially as there was one particular stain on one knee of his little cargo pants that looked suspiciously like raptor poo. Claire made her way out of her son's bedroom, placing the clothes in first of two wash baskets. One was specially designed to keep the smell of any clothes within it from seeping out into the house. That was for Owen's clothes. The other basket was for hers. The parents decided which basket their son's clothes went in based on the state his clothes were in. Today they would be going in Owen's basket. Claire looked down at her own clothes. They would have to go in Owen's basket too. With a tired sigh she walked through to her bedroom to see her son crossed legged on the floor by the dresser, looking at one of his storybooks that he must have left there from the night before. Yes he was always active, and yes he was very adventurous, a lot like Owen had been as a child according to Elizabeth, but Nathaniel also loved reading books, just like she had done as a child. Their son was the perfect mix of both of them.

Claire pulled her clothes off, chucked her bath robe on, and wrapped her filthy clothes in a small ball. She walked back through to the bathroom, placing the clothes in Owen's wash basket on the way, listening to her son talk to himself as he pretended to read his book in the other room. She yawned, leaning over the bath to test the temperature of the shallow water. Just right. She called her son and heard his little voice yell that he was coming followed by the sound of his footsteps thundering through to her. He'd taken his little pants off already and clambered into the bath enthusiastically, "Slow down" Claire found herself saying automatically, though she smiled as his little naked bottom disappeared under the water. He immediately took a handful of bubbles, scooping them up and clapping his hands together. The bubbles flew up into the air landing on his head, face and all around him. The bubbles also landed in Claire's hair and she let out a pretend yelp as though it had taken her by surprise, which Nathaniel found hilarious.

Twenty minutes later, the bath water had gone cold, the bubbles were almost gone and every bath toy Nathaniel Grady owned had been played with. The little boy was soaked from head to foot, most of the mud on his skin having seeped off his body and into the bath water. Claire stood up, turned on the shower, and her son quickly stood up in the bath. She took her bath robe off, checked the temperature of the shower water, and then plucked her son out of the bath letting him run over to the shower cubicle. He jumped into the shower, closely followed by his mother. Claire grabbed for his little shampoo bottle and quickly washed his hair whilst Nathaniel tried to grab the shower water in his mouth. Using the same bottle she washed her own hair, before quickly scrubbing her body down with shower gel, then quickly trying to scrub the last remnants of dirt off her little boy. Claire and Owen had both discovered the only way they could wash their son's hair was if he joined one of them in the shower, so it had become part of their routine that on the days Claire didn't see Nathaniel during the day due to work commitments, she would bath and shower him before dinner, and on Thursday's when Claire took him to work or Sunday's when she had a day off Owen would bath and shower him before dinner.

Claire turned the shower off and her son's face dropped, "Come on, the sooner we get dry and dressed the sooner we can go down and help Daddy cook the fish you caught." She knew all the right things to say, and the almost-three year old's face lit up immediately, remembering that he had 'caught' the dinner. So all she heard for the next ten minutes while she tried to get her little boy dressed was her son chatting away about how he had caught the fish, and how he was a good helper, and how he was excited to go to Mommy's work tomorrow because it meant they had smoothies for lunch. As his head popped up through the top of his pyjama top, and he stuffed his arms through the arm holes, he said something that had caught Claire completely off-guard, "Thank you for picking me Mommy."

Claire smiled, furrowing her brow slightly as she knelt in front of him and pulled her son's t-shirt over his little belly, "What do you mean pick you?" and she watched the little boy before her rocking from side to side as he looked up at the ceiling then back to her seriously with his big green eyes, "When you and Daddy picked me at the baby store and took me home."

It was the sweetest thing she had ever heard. Claire's smile broadened at her son's words. If only it had been that simple. She wouldn't have had to deal with The Board of Directors who had initially tried to get her to step down as Chief Manager of Jurassic World. And they had tried for a couple of years after she had given birth too. It was only until the beginning of this year when several media outlets discovered that Claire and Owen had had a child on the island that The Board realised what an opportunity it was for the park's promotion, and so Claire was no longer being pressured to step down but rather step-up the media campaign. Something that she and Owen had spent a long time discussing when it had first been suggested. In the end they had decided that the odd interview or photoshoot here or there would be okay, as long as it was done under their terms. Claire was getting the feeling she would step-down sometime soon though. Perhaps in a couple of years' time when her son was reaching school age? For now though she seemed to have got her work and home life balanced in her favour, and it didn't seem to affect the park, nor her little family here. Nathaniel was growing up well and it had already been mentioned to both Claire and Owen just how clever their son was. There was a pre-school on the island that the children of Isla Nublar attended. Most were a little older than her son, but there were a couple of new-borns in the area making Nathaniel no longer the youngest child on the island. However, he still held the title of being the first human to be born on the island. Nathaniel, having always been surrounded by adults and older children, was very confident and could read body-language well, and Owen had been told by the pre-school teacher that it wouldn't be long until the little boy could read a small book.

"Well, Daddy and I didn't pick you. You picked us" said Claire, trying to run a small brush gently through her son's blonde hair, which he tolerated, "And we're so happy that you did." Claire leant forward and gave her little boy a noisy kiss on the cheek which he giggled at before launching into her arms. She wrapped her arms under his pyjama-clad bottom as she felt his arms wrap around her neck and she closed her eyes, letting out a little giggle as he squeezed her tight. Her heart felt so full of love for her son that she could never put into words how much she loved him. And seeing how much he looked like Owen filled her heart with joy. Her boyfriend was the perfect father. She always knew he would be. Seeing him with Nathaniel sometimes made her stomach do a back-flip.

Twenty minutes later and Claire was dressed in some white linen trousers and a dark green strappy top. She watched her son fly down the staircase, eager to join his father on the pavilion, but she paused as she reached the lounge, looking over at the coffee table. Claire slowly walked over to it and let out a soft smile as she noticed a magazine that hadn't been on the coffee table that morning when she had left the house for work. It was the latest copy of Vogue Magazine. And on the front cover Claire saw a photo of herself standing in the very lounge she was stood in now, with the caption "CLAIRE DEARING – the woman running the world's most successful theme park talks work, love, and motherhood."


	27. CLAIRE DEARING - Work, Love & Motherhood

**VOGUE MAGAZINE - JUNE 2020**

 **WHO** **RUN THE WORLD?**

 **Running Jurassic World May Not Be Everyone's Cup** **Of** **Tea, But For CLAIRE DEARING It's Just A Way Of Life.**  
 **Here She Discusses Work, Love, And Motherhood.**

 **-words by PENNY CORKETT-**

 **S** tepping onto the island of Isla Nublar is an odd feeling to describe. Gone but not forgotten is the general consensus regarding the tragedy that was Jurassic World back in 2015, when over 5,000 people lost their lives and over 10,000 sustained horrific injuries. Most people remember what they were doing when they heard about the breakout at the theme park. Most people remember what they were doing when it was announced that Jurassic World would reopen, with only herbivore dinosaurs as attractions. Now, three years since reopening and the theme park is as popular as ever, boasting around 25,000 visitors a day. And in control of the world's most famous theme park is Claire Dearing.

I admit I was nervous when I stepped out of the taxi provided by Ms Dearing to take me to the north-west of the island, where she lives in a very small community of large homes belonging to the senior members of staff at the park. I had no idea what to expect, having never met her before. All I have seen of her is what many people have seen of her: images and videos from media coverage of the court cases that were being held by the families that sued Misrani Ltd for the 2015 disaster. The clips and images depicted her arriving and leaving the court, straight faced, with no more than a few strong words spoken out at the media any time they tried to block her path. The Claire Dearing I had pictured in my head was a strict, cold, no-nonsense woman, whose red-hair gave the impression that she was easily angered.

However, the moment I began walking up to the large white house, the front door swung open and there stood the very woman who I thought I feared. Except she wasn't this scary dragon people made her out to be. Standing at just 5ft 5in, the woman beams at me from her position in the doorway, asking if I had a safe journey over. Her hair is not up in the tight bun and she is not in a tight white suit with sharp white heels, the look that most people associate her with. Instead the 37 year old is dressed in a pair of high-waisted jeans and a bold green top that highlights her green eyes. Her red hair falls just below her shoulders and has a loose wave to it. She warmly invites me into her home and I follow her, taking a seat on the couch as she walks, bare foot, into the kitchen nearby to make us some coffee. The lounge is tidy, as I imagined it would be, with an impressive fish tank running along one of the walls.

Once she returns with cups of coffee the woman relaxes into the other couch in the room, curling her legs up underneath her body as she nurses the hot cup of coffee. I admit it takes me a while to pluck up the courage to begin asking her any questions, but I eventually get around to asking her how life has been since returning to the island. "At first it was difficult, not only because I was overseeing the recapture of the dinosaurs that had escaped, but I was also having to oversee the reconstruction of the lower-side of the island, as well as trying to communicate the progress and decisions with Mr Misrani's Board of Directors. All that and trying to sort out my personal life on the side, you can imagine it was a very stressful time."

The personal life she refers to is the relationship she began with Senior Raptor Trainer, Owen Grady, shortly after the disaster of 2015. "It's really thanks to Owen that we made it out of there in just about one piece," Claire admits, as she reflects on the day the Indominious Rex broke out of its paddock, "He used to be in the navy so knows every survival skill under the sun." but she's quick to add that she was far from the damsel in distress "Oh I saved his skin a couple of times too. Neither of us would have survived if we hadn't been together" and they've been together ever since. Shortly after the disaster, and following the tragic death of billionaire investor Simon Misrani, Claire was made head of Misrani's 'Jurassic World' investment. After the decision by The Board of Directors to re-open the park was revealed to her, Claire returned to the island with Owen in tow. "I don't think either of us had expected to go back, but he was pretty adamant that if I was going then he would go too and we've been here ever since" the red-head says of her boyfriend of four and a half years.

Those years haven't gone by without difficulties though, with Claire revealing that both she and Owen had had to attend separate counselling sessions to tackle problems that were later revealed to be symptoms of PTSD, "Owen would wake in the middle of the night, sweating, freaking out that something had happened to me" she explains "and for a long time I would hear screams. Even if I was in an empty room I would still hear screaming." It wasn't until a year after their return to the island, when Claire discovered that she was pregnant, that the symptoms had stopped, "I was definitely in shock when I found out I was pregnant! I think my mind was suddenly full of questions about the uncertainty of my future that the screaming was drowned out by my thoughts and new fears." And those fears? "I guess I was terrified I would be a terrible mother. I hadn't the first clue about taking care of a baby" she admits, taking a swig of coffee and staring over at a photo on the fireplace of a new-born baby, the smile on her face telling me it's her child.

In June 2017 Claire gave birth to a baby boy, Nathaniel Johnny Grady, named after her late father, and Owen's late brother. A renowned workaholic, the new mother took eight months off to care for her son, "That hadn't been my plan," she admits, revealing that she'd initially intended on only taking a couple of weeks maternity leave before returning to work, "It's hard to describe but from the moment I first held my son in my arms I felt this unbreakable bond between us. There's no way to describe it. I'd never felt love like it before. And suddenly the days had turned into weeks, weeks into months, and then one day I just felt ready to start back at work again. I'd missed it. I knew I would miss all the time spent with my baby but at the same time I couldn't justify remaining on this island if I didn't go back to work." Returning to work meant that routine changed for her son. Claire would take him into work with her once a week, three days of the week he would go to work with his father, and the other days were spent at home. Two years on and the routine hasn't changed too much with the only difference being Monday's when Nathaniel attends the local playschool, "Owen and I decided that while our son is still very young we want to ensure that his learning goes beyond that of the four walls of his playgroup. So we take him to work with us, that way he meets a wide range of people from different walks of life. He gains confidence, and learns communication skills, manners and patience along with having a rather unique childhood and I think that's really important for a young child to experience."

And it all appears to be paying off. The first time I meet Nathaniel Grady, the little boy who turns three next month, dashes straight through the front door with a big grin on his face, marches straight up to me and shakes my hand politely. Looking the spitting image of his father, except the bright green eyes of his mother and bright blonde hair that is common in children with a parent who has red hair, Nate Grady is every bit the little charmer that will make him a heartbreaker in his teens. Brimming with confidence and not afraid to talk, I sit and listen while he gushes to me about how much he loves dinosaurs, in particular Raptors. As he talks he joins his mother, sitting on her lap and swinging his legs while she looks at him with an affectionate smile on her face. Any concerns I once had about meeting this woman were completely diminished by now.

There is a pause when her son runs out of things to say, and Claire calls him her little chatterbox. I ask if she and Owen are considering on having any more children but she quickly shakes her head with a smile, "Not right now. This little rascal keeps us busy enough. Besides, I've still got the park to run, and Owen is preparing his Raptor for the newest attraction which opens at the end of next month. So now isn't the best time to be planning for another baby." Naturally our conversation moves to the topic of wedding bells, and I ask if an engagement is on the horizon, but the woman before me looks doubtful, "Owen and I have never talked about getting married," she reveals "but I can't imagine spending my life with anyone else." So if he were to ask her to marry him, would she say yes? "Of course," Claire says, her green eyes lighting up slightly at the thought, "but only if he wanted to. If not then that's okay, I'm happy enough with our situation. We have great jobs, a lovely house, a great relationship and the most perfect son."

A car door slams outside and the little boy quickly scrambles off his mother's lap to run out of the front door yelling his father's name. "I think going to work with his Daddy is Nate's favourite thing," Claire says as she looks over at the front door, "he loves watching the feeding sessions and sitting in on a lot of the training Owen does with his Raptor. He's even started helping by throwing the food they give her as a reward for good behaviour." So does this mean the title of Raptor Trainer will be passed down to the next generation of Grady's? "Not if I can help it," Claire says with a laugh, "It's a pretty dangerous job and like any mother I wouldn't want my son to put himself in danger. But I'm sure Nate eventually becoming a trainer is something that's crossed Owen's mind already, whether it be specifically for a Raptor or not. At the end of the day so long as my son is happy then I am happy."

Her attention is moved to someone walking through the front door and that someone is her son's father, Senior Raptor Trainer, Owen Grady. Grady began working at the park eight years ago on the Raptor training programme created by In-Gen, a partner company in the Misrani family. He takes a seat beside Claire, his rugged stubble enhancing his chiselled facial features. He apologises for being late, "Has she been complaining about me being late?" he asks me with a cheeky grin and shoots Claire a wink as she nudges him, rolling her eyes at his action. But she still has a calm smile on her face. To look at they are an almost impossibly attractive couple, but it hadn't always been plain sailing, "The first time we met he bumped into me, spilling the coffee he had in his hands all down my dress" Claire giggles, looking over at Owen who is biting his bottom lip guiltily, "and it was a white dress!" Not long after that he had asked her out on a date, which she had agreed to. The rest, you would think, was history, but not yet. "Both of us were working overtime so neither of us made it to the location." Owen remembers, before Claire continues that they both presumed they had stood the other up. Contact stopped between them for a year, until Claire was promoted to Senior Operations and Asset Manager (the position below her current top position of Park Manager). "She just arrived at the Raptor paddock one day to show some investors around. We got talking and I finally got the courage to ask her out again." This time they both made it to the date, but confessed that neither of them had enjoyed it. "I was too organised" Claire says with a guilty look on her face, "And I was too stubborn." Owen responds with an equally guilty look. The date had been a failure and the couple had no reason to see each other again until the disaster of 2015 when they were both in the thick of the drama, " My nephews had gone missing. But this guy stepped up." Claire gestures to the man beside her, "Without him I would have never found them. We would have never made it off the island alive" and it's with that sobering thought that the room suddenly goes silent.

It's easy to get caught up in the stories told by the visitors who had been at the park that day. It's easy to only focus on the number of people killed and injured. And it's easy to blame the Misrani Company for the tragedy of that day. But it's also easy to forget that while Claire Dearing had been the face of the corporation at many of the court hearings following the incident, she was also a victim too. Gaining an impressive large scar on her back and suffering from PTSD following the incident were just a couple of examples of the torture she had been through following that tragic accident. She was the one who had had to keep her head held high and represent the company she worked for who took the blame. But she isn't the one to blame. Owen is quick to place her on a pedestal and rightfully so, "Surviving that tragedy was a team effort. She's a real trooper. We ran a lot, she kept a calm head when necessary, and saved my life on more than one occasion that day. And she did it all in heels. I mean if that's not the sign of a strong woman I don't know what is." And I have to agree with him.

By the time I leave the house and set off back to the south of the island, I'm in what I can only describe as a state of shock. Having spent so many years painting a picture of how Claire Dearing was in my head, a picture that had been compiled due to false claims and harsh press coverage, it had shocked me at just how down-to-earth she was. Yes, she may be leading the way in a challenging career as the head of one of the largest theme parks in the world. But she is also a mother. A partner. A woman. And a strong one at that.

Turn to page 296 for our exclusive interview with Owen Grady.  
To book tickets to visit Jurassic World please visit www . jurassicworld .com


	28. Fish & Rats

The final fish was on the grill of the BBQ and Owen looked over at his house on his left to see his son running out of the kitchen door, along the porch, down the porch steps, and across the grass towards him. The little boy's blonde hair was still a bit damp, even with the muggy atmosphere the island provided, and he wore his favourite pyjamas that had a giant cartoon T-Rex face on the front of the pyjama shirt. "Slow down" Owen found himself saying automatically as the almost-three year old headed straight for him. He and Claire said it so often now that they sometimes found they said it even when Nathaniel was staying still. The little rascal was always on the go, and it was exhausting. Owen watched as his son reached him, approached a white chalked line, and stood obediently behind it. The father had drawn it as a precautionary measure in case his overly-curious little boy stood too close to the burning grills on the large BBQ. He'd drawn the line long enough so they could both stand behind it together. And there they stood. Owen grinned as he saw Nathaniel step up on his tip-toes to peer at the fish that sizzled away. The little boy loved to help him prepare and cook food, and Owen loved to show him. The two were relatively inseparable most of the time, and Owen loved all the time he got to spend with his son, to teach him skills and to ensure he had the best childhood any kid could have. Nathaniel was a quick learner and Owen was a patient teacher, so the two Grady's made a rather perfect team. "Daddy? Do raptors like fish?"

Owen smiled as his son turned to look up at him inquisitively with his big green eyes that looked so much like his mother's, "What do you think son?" Owen was curious to know what the little boy might be thinking. He came up with some very funny ideas sometimes.

"I think…they do." Nathaniel said eventually, after some thought, and his father gave him a small nod in agreement with the little Grady. The father and son turned their attention back to the fish on the grill as the sun began its slow decent, drawing the evening in slightly.

Owen froze, cocking his head slightly in confusion as he looked from his position on the bridge down to his raptor who had raced over to see him, knowing that with the arrival of her alpha meant at some point there would be food. He held his eight month old son in his arms. Today was the first time he had brought Nathaniel to the paddock, as today marked Claire's first day back at work full-time. The couple had agreed that Owen would take their baby son with him to work three days a week, Claire would take their baby son to work on a Thursday, and they would take Sunday's off together as a family day. On Monday's and Saturday's Nathaniel would be cared for by Cassie, the midwife who had helped Claire through her pregnancy and labour. The red-head trusted nobody else with her son while she and Owen were at work more than she did Cassie. And Claire ensured they paid her a lot of money to make her trip over to Isla Nublar twice a week worthwhile.

Owen looked from the raptor to his son. Nathaniel, the once babbling, curious little baby was sat in his father's arms, staring down at the dinosaur in a trance-like state. Owen had never seen his son stay still like that before and he followed his gaze back down at Blue. The raptor was in an equally trance-like state, and Owen was immediately reminded of the times Claire had come to the paddock when she had been pregnant. The dinosaur had taken no notice of anything or anyone but had instead kept her entire attention on Claire. Owen held his breath, then slowly began walking along the bridge. The raptor's head followed them intently, and Nathaniel didn't take his big green eyes off the dinosaur below. Was there a possibility that the raptor and the baby boy had some sort of a connection? Could she sense that he was her alpha's son?

"So…does that mean Blue likes fish too?"

Owen turned to his son with a smile and gave a little shrug, "I suppose it does son" the man replied, and he watched as the boy looked away thoughtfully. Nathaniel was young, but he was very sharp. His attention to detail was impeccable, a trait that he had inherited from both his parents. His mother had a sharp attention to detail when it came to numbers, facts, and the way a room or area was set out. His father had sharp attention to detail when it came to tracking, and trying to understand people and animals, their personality, body language, and mood. Nathaniel Grady had already proved that he had inherited his father's attention to detail in people and animals, and his mother's attention to detail in the way a room or area was set out. Owen didn't doubt for a minute that the moment the boy could read, count, and write fully that his son would become somewhat unstoppable. "Why don't you give her fish?" he heard Nathaniel ask.

Owen took two pairs of tongs and began turning each fish as he spoke, "We've never given her fish. She likes pigs, goats, and rats." He didn't want to get into the ins-and-outs of different kinds of meat. "But she seems to like those." he added at the end.

Owen turned the final fish then looked down to his left at his son who stood by his side, but the boy still had a thoughtful frown on his face, "I bet she'd really like fish." Owen couldn't help the smile that crept across his face. It was fascinating taking Nathaniel into work with him three days a week. Not just to see the way his son developed and interacted with his raptor, but to also see the way his raptor developed and interacted with his son. In a way, it was thanks to the little boy that the raptor had advanced so well in her training.

Owen pulled up to the raptor paddock and turned his car engine off. Turning to his left he saw his son staring out at the big paddock gate eagerly. It was March, and only three months until Blue was set to become the Park's newest attraction. Up until the New Year nobody in the world beyond those who worked on the island knew that there was still one carnivorous dinosaur left at Jurassic World. The idea of Raptor performances had been long discussed at one point during working hours and each time Owen would get defensive, saying that Blue was not for performing. But he had a change of heart when, at around fifteen months old, and seven months since first attending work with his father, there were signs that Nathaniel and Blue had a stronger connection than first thought. It had been something small to start with, like Blue only obeying Owen's orders if the toddler was the one to throw her the rewards. These rewards were dead rats thrown one at a time from a bucket, which Owen hadn't realised his son had delved into and thrown the very first time the little rascal had done it until it was too late. His team had found it hilarious. He on the other hand had freaked out that his son would poison himself somehow. But the raptor had responded correctly and obeyed Owen's command. So now the routine was that each time Nathaniel entered the bridge of the paddock he had to wear little gloves that they had tracked down online. And he wasn't to tell his mother what he did during the days he went to work with his father.

Owen jumped out of his jeep, and wandered around to the passenger side to tug his son out of his booster seat. The little boy scrambled out of his father's arms, dressed in little cargo pants and a fresh t-shirt that Owen knew wouldn't stay clean for long, and he dashed over to the office with his Jurassic World lunchbox in his little hand. Owen grinned as he heard Barry greet Nathaniel from inside the office. It wouldn't be long before the world would know about the little boy and who his parents were as Claire had reluctantly arranged an interview and photoshoot with Vogue magazine, due to the pressure of the stupid Board of Directors who wanted more publicity for the park. Owen had been as equally reluctant to be involved, and he originally had been entirely uninvolved, until one of the raptor team had spotted Claire carrying Nathaniel across the Hub area of the park a couple of Thursday's ago. That team member had told several co-workers around the Hub, and eventually, somehow, it had got back to The Board. According to Claire, her bosses had seemed 'thrilled' at the idea of her having had a child with the Senior Raptor Trainer, stating that it was 'publicity gold'. Not just for the park, but also in time for the opening of the raptor paddock that they had eventually worn Claire down about. With the threat of shutting down the raptor programme and destroying Blue, Claire had had no choice but to agree to do an interview and photoshoot, with her only term being that she got to choose the magazine from the list they had clearly already compiled. The only remotely respectable ones on the list had been 'Vogue' or 'Time Magazine', and Owen knew the main reason Claire had chosen 'Vogue' was because she had read it since she had been a pre-teen. So the little family were set to do a photoshoot and interview at their home in a couple of weeks' time.

Owen stepped through the door of the office to see Nathaniel already struggling to get his little plastic gloves on his little hands, his tongue sticking out of the corner of his mouth as he concentrated hard. Barry sat at a computer in the corner of the office, looking through the predicted statistics for visitors who were likely to visit the paddock in three months' time when they were due to open to the public.

"Any luck with breakfast?" Owen asked his best friend while he wandered over to the store cupboard, grabbing some disinfectant wipes to give to his son, who still struggled with his gloves.

"She chased the pig and eventually ate it, but she didn't listen to me when I told her to come to the bridge." Owen sighed a little at Barry's response. Over the past year, since the confirmation that the raptor paddock would be opening to the public in the summer of 2020, the raptor team lead by Owen and Barry had worked hard to get Blue adjusted to a new routine that would suit the visiting times in the summer. But it had taken a lot of work. If Blue continued to only answer to Owen when it came to 'performing' then the team were in trouble, because it would mean Owen would have to be there seven days a week. Which was impossible. It wasn't that Owen couldn't do it. It would just mean he would lose out on the 'family day off' that he and Claire had worked hard to create and maintain since returning to work full time.

"Right," Owen said with another sigh, as he bent down to help his son with the plastic gloves, "Well I guess her eating is some sort of progress?" he said optimistically.

"Owen, you and I both know that she's not going to be ready by June." Barry said, turning in his chair to look at his best friend.

"She'll be ready. She's just not going to be ready for anyone else but me." Owen said, standing up straight after sorting his son's gloves then handing the two year old a pack of disinfectant hand wipes to take to the paddock, before he put his own gloves on.

"Claire's going to kill you, you know."

Owen gave his best friend a grin, as his son began walking out of the office. Barry wasn't joking. Claire would kill him if she found out that the only way Blue would be ready for visitors in three months' time was if he was there for each 'performance'. She would have to decide between her head and her heart. Her head would tell her it was best for the park, that attendance would spike and profits increase. But her heart would break to know that her boyfriend would be away from the house for most of the day on a Sunday, their day off. Owen ran out of the office after his son, and met him at a small metal storage box beside the paddock. The man unlocked then pulled open the doors and watched as Nathaniel stepped inside, grabbing the handle of a bucket, and tugging it out to the front of the box. Owen delved into a freezer unit, pulling out frozen dead rats. He and his son counted them out as they put them into the bucket. Owen felt proud he had taught his son to count to twenty, though he hadn't ever told Claire it was because they counted rats.

Once the two Grady's got to the top of the metal steps and began making their way across the bridge, they called out to the raptor. The father bellowed her name and the two year old yelled her name shortly after, like a squeakier echo. Suddenly a rustling could be heard and the familiar thundering sounds of the dinosaur came from the bushes until Blue arrived below the bridge, pausing to assess who was on the bridge. She recognised them almost immediately and called out to them. Owen grinned as he heard Nathaniel let out a giggle, before saying good morning to their raptor. The animal called back, and Nathaniel bent down, taking one of the big rats in his little hands. The humidity and heat of the sun on Isla Nublar meant that the rats were no longer very frozen. The little boy took two steps up a little wooden platform his father had built for him, and chucked the rat over the railing of the bridge. Blue immediately snapped it up, much to the young Grady's delight.

"Good girl!" Owen heard his son yell at the raptor, which Blue had responded to with a little growl. He hated to admit it, but if only his son were about twelve years older. Then he could get Nathaniel to lead the performances, and he knew that Blue would perform just fine for him. Claire would have taken some talking around of course, but they could've made it work. The thing was, so much of what he let Nathaniel do at the paddock he kept a secret from his girlfriend. Well, not a secret, but it was more like he avoided telling her the exact details of what he let their son get away with.

Owen looked up from his son to the house and saw his girlfriend walking out onto the porch, carrying the magazine. His stomach knotted as he remembered a section he had read from her interview in the magazine when it had been delivered earlier that morning: "Owen and I have never talked about getting married," she reveals "but I can't imagine spending my life with anyone else." So if he were to ask her to marry him, would she say yes? "Of course," Claire says, her green eyes lighting up slightly at the thought, "but only if he wanted to. If not then that's okay, I'm happy enough with our situation. We have great jobs, a lovely house, a great relationship and the most perfect son."

She wasn't lying. They hadn't ever spoken about it. They'd spoken about their future together of course. How long they intended on staying on the island for, where they would relocate to, whether they wanted to send Nathaniel to college (Claire was a strong yes, Owen was a strong no stating that he'd turned out just fine without attending college) but they had never discussed getting married. Owen had always presumed over the 4 and a half years that they had been together that because Claire had never brought the subject up it wasn't on her mind or in her life plans. That her decision to give their son his surname of 'Grady' was commitment enough for her. A big enough gesture to say "I'm with you for life" kind of thing. So he had been surprised and a little upset to see that not only did she want to marry him, but that the way he found out was by reading it in a magazine. And reading that she was 'happy enough'. What did that even mean? Was there something he wasn't doing now that could make her happier? And her saying she would marry him 'only if he wanted to', well of course he wanted to! Being able to look at her and know she was his wife. There was no man on the planet who wouldn't want that.

"Daddy I think the fish is burnt" Owen snapped out of his little daydream at the sound of his son's voice and realised that his girlfriend was almost at the pavilion they were stood at, looking at him with a curious smile on her face. He looked down at the fish on the grill. His son was almost correct, the fish was in fact beginning to burn, but hadn't burnt just yet. He turned the meat again, and noticed Claire had reached into one of the cabinets beside the pavilion, pulling out two large plates and one small plate. He admired her figure in her white linen trousers and strap-top. He'd caught her staring at her body in the mirror on several occasions since giving birth to their son almost three years ago. She complained that it hadn't been the same since and she was right, it hadn't. There was a small pocket of stretch marks along the lower part of her stomach, her 'jelly-belly' as she had named it when their son had pointed it out to her one day, and it meant that Claire always wore relatively high-waisted clothes to hide it. Owen would catch her running her fingers over her 'jelly-belly' whilst staring at it in the mirror in the evenings before bed or the mornings before work, complaining about the change to her body. No matter how many times he reminded her that her body had carried a baby for nine months and that it was never going to look the same, she still ignored his reassurance. It wasn't until Cassie had sat Claire down over a cup of tea and told the woman exactly the same thing that Owen had told her that Claire had begun to listen. Owen made sure he told his girlfriend every day that he loved every bit of her, to make her more body-confident, and it seemed to work.

"Everything okay?" he heard her ask him, and Owen nodded with a grin as he watched her call their son round to the table in the centre of the pavilion where she stood, holding Nathaniel's large apron that they made him wear during mealtimes to prevent his clothes from getting too dirty. Owen slowly began taking the fish off the grill onto the serving dish one by one, watching Claire lift their son into his chair and struggling to get his little arms into the apron as the almost-three year old leant over to grab a slice of bread from the bread bowl on the table. But instead of grabbing the bread, Nathaniel froze and let out a little gasp as his big green eyes landed on the front cover of the magazine his mother had placed on the table.

"Mommy!" the little boy exclaimed, reaching out for the magazine. Owen made his way around to the table, placing the fish in the centre. Claire was busy rustling through the pages of the magazine to find the photos from their family photoshoot to show Nathaniel. Owen had been pleased to see that in the main interview he was only in two of the photos, the rest were of Claire, with one of just Claire and their son. He remembered what a nightmare it had been to try to keep Nathaniel clean that morning. His hands and face, his clothes, his hair. Fortunately the shoot had been a lot shorter than Owen had expected and within a couple of hours they were finished. So he had taken their son back to the raptor paddock with him as it had been a Tuesday and Claire had made her way down to the south of the island to the control room once the magazine's photographer had finished shooting her.

While Owen dished out the food he saw his son point to one of the photos. It was of the three of them. Nathaniel was sat on the wooden balcony of the pavilion whilst his parents stood behind him, holding him steady in case he fell off. And they all looked like they were laughing very loudly, because they had been. A second or so before the photo had been taken Nathaniel had exclaimed boldly that his parents should look at him because was the star of the show, something the interviewer had said to the little boy when she had first met him ("and here is the star of the show. You must be Nathaniel."), and it had caught his parents so off-guard that they could do nothing but laugh. "This one," said the little boy, his finger on the photo, "this is my favourite."


	29. The Little Snitch & Owen's Words

The sun dipped below the horizon and dusk fell on the island of Isla Nublar. Claire sat, cross-legged, on the cool laminate floor of her son's bedroom beside his bed. Thanks to the black—out blinds across the windows the room was pitch black, except for a dim ray of dusk daylight drifting in from the landing through the half-open door, and the dinosaur night-light that stood on the chest of draws behind her. The dim light was just enough to highlight the edges of the furniture in the room, the mother, and her son. Claire had a relaxed smile on her face, watching her little boy's chest rise and fall steadily as he finally drifted off to sleep. This was one of her favourite times in the day. To be able to sit in the peace and quiet, looking over at the most important person in her life. Her heart swelled as she felt him grip three of her fingers on her right hand while he dreamt and she gently glazed her thumb across the back of his little hand.

Claire had heard a gentle creak from the staircase whilst she had been reading Nathaniel his final bedtime story, and knew that it had been her boyfriend. She had heard him a little later across the landing taking a shower before pottering about in their bedroom. However, since their son had fallen asleep she had heard nothing. She looked over to the door and saw Owen stood in the doorway, leaning against the doorframe with his arms crossed, a relaxed smile on his face as he looked down at her and their son. Claire followed his gaze back down to their little boy and she let out a smile. She loved how much he looked like Owen. His little fingers, his nose, his mouth, the shape of his face, even his eyebrows. His bright blonde hair was just how his father's had been when he had been his age. The bit of her that Nathaniel had inherited were her green eyes and her ears. The rest was all Owen. She had to admit, even if her bosses hadn't found out by word of mouth it was highly likely they would've eventually noticed how much her son looked like the Senior Raptor Trainer.

Claire stepped out of the car, her heels clicking on the concrete of the road that had brought her to the entrance of the building where her office was located. Her plan for the day was to pop into her office, check through her emails, then head over to the control room in time for the gates of the park to open. Today they were expecting their biggest influx of visitors in weeks, all thanks to a new advertising campaign that starred Louisa White, one of Hollywood's leading ladies of the moment. Then, once she felt confident that her Senior Operations and Assets Manager, Maggie, was on top of everything, she would be leading a review of her second in command, Melanie. But Friday's were Claire's second favourite day of her working week because it was the day Cassie would bring Nathaniel to meet her on her lunch break. It was the only day of the week that she didn't work through her lunch break. It was an hour and a half of devoted time to her son.

Claire walked through into the reception area of the office, smiling politely at the receptionist behind the desk. The receptionist looked at her slightly uncomfortably, and if the Park Manager hadn't already walked passed her she would have asked why she had looked that way. Instead Claire reached out, pushing the elevator button, and the doors pinged open immediately. As she went up to the sixth floor the woman looked at her watch. 7.50am. Early as usual. The sooner she got her emails read the sooner she could get on with her day and the sooner her lunch break would roll around. Claire entered her office, shrugging her white jacket off her shoulders, placing it on the coat rack by the door, then walked over to her desk where her computer lay.

She froze as her office phone rang. The tone echoed off the walls. Claire stared at the phone with a slightly furrowed brow. Nobody ever rang her at this time. And if they did then it would be on her cell phone. And it would usually be Owen asking where she had put something of Nathaniel's. Claire lifted the receiver up to her ear and said her name with little confidence. The voice on the other end was of the head of Misrani's Board of Directors, Richard. As he gave her a relatively warm greeting Claire furrowed her brow. He had never sounded so friendly before. If anything he and the rest of the board had been trying to get her to quit for a good few years now, since she had announced to them she was pregnant. She could tell by the sound on the other end of the line that she was currently on loudspeaker, which probably meant The Board were gathered together, listening in on the conversation. Glancing at the clock on her wall she saw it would be nearing 11am over in New York, where their office was based.

"Claire, we were informed late yesterday afternoon of your son's paternity. We know it is Owen Grady. The Raptor trainer." Claire felt her heart jump into her throat, beating at what felt like a million beats a minute. How did they know? She hadn't told anyone and she felt sure Owen hadn't either. He knew how important it was to her that nobody find out.

"Oh…well yes." she found herself stuttering. What could she say? She couldn't exactly deny it. They didn't have to be genius's to guess that Owen was the father of her child. Nathaniel looked exactly like him. Claire was still frozen to the spot as her boss continued talking:

"Now, normally we wouldn't be pleased about this news. You know how bad it looks to the staff in the park to know that their top manager had relations with a lower member of staff…" Claire screwed her nose up. She didn't like Richard's description. It sounded as though her relationship with Owen meant nothing when really it meant everything to her. He made it sound like she and the Raptor trainer had had a 'quickie' in the cleaner's cupboard and she had fallen pregnant as a result.

"Actually Owen and I are in a relationship. We have been for a few years now, so I would appreciate it if you didn't make it sound like we had a fling, Richard." Claire said sharply. She held her breath. She didn't normally say the first thing that came to her mind when she was talking to The Board. There sounded like there was a moment of unrest on the other end and Claire took a deep breath, trying to unjumble her thoughts.

"Well, that's certainly good news Claire. We feared for a moment it was all a bit of a scandal. We can't let a scandal get loose to the media or it'll tarnish the reputation of the park."

Claire brought a hand to her face and rubbed her forehead gently. The worst thing about keeping her private life private was that people had a habit of simply presuming what was going on when she left work for the day, "There's no scandal Richard, so you have nothing to worry about."

"Good," the man said on the other end of the phone. He seemed a little too pleased for Claire's liking and she was beginning to feel uncomfortable, "Well now that you have confirmed it we'll have a little discussion here about the next steps and call you later."

"Hang on a minute, what could you possibly want to discuss? Richard, my son is three in June. There's no scandal. Owen and I have kept our relationship very private before and we have plans to go public. And none of this has affected the running of the park." she had spoken far quicker than she had first intended and felt somewhat disappointed in herself. But she was panicking. Just as she had panicked when her bosses had insisted she be interviewed for a magazine to promote the park. Just as she had panicked when they had told her she would be asked questions about her job, and about being a mother. She really didn't want to get her son involved for fear that there would be a growing interest in him and his safety would be jeopardised.

"Well Claire, here's the thing. We think you and Mr Grady should go public," Claire's face fell and her hand dropped to her side in disbelief as her boss continued to talk, "and that you should do it in the interview you have arranged with Vogue. There'll be a photographer going along with the interviewer and we think if you, Mr Grady, and…your son…"

"Nathaniel" Claire helped, her tone oozing displeasure at what The Board were suggesting.

"…Nathaniel, yes. We think that if the three of you have just a couple of family photos together, it would make that edition of the magazine far more popular and appealing, particularly for hard-working mothers. Mothers who would be likely to bring their families to the park."

Claire sighed, sitting down in her office chair. There was a long pause as she stared at the clock. Owen had been reluctant for her to do the interview in the first place. He was going to lose it when she told him that her bosses had found out about their relationship and that he would now have to be involved in the magazine article.

"How did you find out about Owen?" she asked in a stern voice. If there was any way she could find out it would be through them. She would feel better if she found out that it hadn't been her fault someone had found out.

"One of the raptor team saw you carrying his son around the park yesterday." Claire rolled her eyes. Of course it was one of the raptor team. The little snitch. And to think she had been staying away from the Raptor paddock to avoid any rumours of her and Owen. "Claire we'd actually like to know how one of the raptor team members know what your son looks like" she put her head in her hand and sighed. She would have to tell them about Nathaniel going to the Raptor paddock with Owen. She was about to get into a lot of trouble.

Claire scrunched her face up as she gently eased her right hand from her son's loose grip, hoping not to wake him. She pushed herself up onto her knees, pulled her little boy's blonde hair from his forehead, and kissed him delicately, before standing up and creeping out of his bedroom. She stopped at the door, taking one last glance back at her son, and she felt Owen move up to her, placing his arms around her waist. The parents stood in silence for a moment looking over at their little boy. There were still times like this when Claire wanted to pinch herself. All that she had in life right now was everything that she had once dreamt of having. A great career, a house, a child, a…well, an Owen. It may not have all happened the way she had planned in her head, but it was all here. She felt Owen kiss her neck before pulling away and making his way downstairs and she took one last look at her sleeping son before following her boyfriend.

Claire walked from the bottom of the stairs over to the couch. She noticed the magazine was back on the coffee table and picked it up before easing into the soft couch with a tired sigh. She began rifling through the pages, landing on the pages of her interview and began reading through it, having not done so earlier, instead having chosen to look at the photos. She had to admit, she looked amazing in them, and she presumed that was the perk of a high quality camera and Photoshop.

Claire felt a surge of relief as she read the opening few paragraphs of the 'interview', the interviewer mentioning how unintimidating and nice 'Ms Dearing' was. That had been her intention. To not give off the impression that she was this mean, hard-faced, corporate individual that the press had made her out to be in the past. Her heart jumped into her mouth as she read Owen's name for the first time, but as she read Claire noticed that the interviewer had used plenty of her direct quotes about her boyfriend, not that she could really remember much of the interview when it had been done. Again her heart thudded in her mouth as she read her son's name, and she almost stopped reading there and then, for fear that the interview would be distasteful. But to her relief the interview had published more of her direct quotes to the point that Claire thought she came off very well. And her heart soared with pride as she read the interviewer's description of her little boy:

'Nate Grady is every bit the little charmer that will make him a heartbreaker in his teens. Brimming with confidence and not afraid to talk, I sit and listen while he gushes to me about how much he loves dinosaurs, in particular Raptors.'

Claire looked up from the magazine as her boyfriend walked over to join her, placing a glass of wine and a bottle of beer on the coffee table in front of the couch, before sitting beside her. She snuggled up to him as he put his arm around her shoulder, and she resumed her attention on the magazine. She heard Owen open his mouth as though he was about to say something, but he didn't, and so she brought her head up to look at him curiously. He had gone pale. Well as pale as he could go with his tan. She watched as his eyes met hers, and to her surprised he apologised, "I'm sorry" he said quietly, "About the whole marriage thing. I hadn't realised you'd wanted to get married. Actually I thought you didn't want to get married. So that's why I've never asked you."

Claire knew her mouth was open. She was in shock. Was that why he had been acting strange this evening? Why he had been looking at her with that odd look on his face? "Owen that's okay. We've never talked about it." She began saying but he pointed at the magazine, directly on her quote when she told the interviewer about marriage plans. Claire looked down at the interview and her eyes hone in on the line that read:

' So if he were to ask her to marry him, would she say yes? "Of course," Claire says, her green eyes lighting up slightly at the thought…'

Oh God. Had her eyes really lit up? Of course she wanted to marry him. She loved him. And since the interview she had loved the idea of becoming Claire Grady and having the same surname as Owen and their son. But she had never intended on putting any pressure on him to propose. She'd said so herself in the interview: "I'm happy enough with our situation" and she really was.

Claire turned her position on the couch so she was facing her boyfriend, whose face had dropped. He was looking rather disappointed and she felt terrible that it was her fault, "Owen, this interview, the interviewer, she put me completely on the spot with that question. Maybe if someone had asked us about it before then we might have spoken about it? But there aren't many people on the island who know about our relationship. We've managed to go four years without people questioning it."

"Yeah and we've managed to go four years without talking about getting married. That's my fault Claire." Claire hesitated. Why was he blaming himself for this? She felt they had a relatively modern relationship. They both had careers, and they both did their fair share around the house. Why was it necessarily his responsibility to bring up the conversation of marriage?

"Well…let's talk about it then." She found herself saying with a shrug, and her words had caught her by surprise almost as much as they had done with him. She saw Owen hesitate, looking at her as though not entirely sure if she was being serious or not. But Claire was deadly serious. If they were going to take their relationship further, then it was best they start talking about it. "Do you want to get married?" she asked him straight. To her surprise he let out a small grin, then raised his eyebrows, "You didn't read my interview." she heard him say.

Claire furrowed her brow slightly. His interview? She had no idea he'd had an interview too. She watched as he took the magazine from her with a smile, flicked through, and landed on a double-page spread with his photo on one side, and what looked to be an interview on the other. Claire suddenly felt guilty that she hadn't noticed it before. In bold letters in the middle of the interview section stood the quote, 'I guess I should have known there and then that I was in love with her…' and her heart began to race. She looked up at Owen, tears forming in her eyes. He had declared his love for her in a magazine article? She looked back down and began reading his interview quickly. Her eyes landed on the section that the large quote had been taken from:

"I remember the first time I ever saw her. We were at a meeting and she was pretty new to the park and already in at a high-level role. I saw her across the room. She was wearing a smart white suit. I mean, of course she was, it's Claire. Her hair was really long back then but up in a bun and…I dunno, I guess I should have known there and then that I was in love with her because I was speechless and my heart was racing and…" he pauses and with the look he has on his face as he reminisces of that time I think I've fallen a bit in love with him too. His cheeks flush a bit and he lets out a nervous laugh, saying that he sounds stupid and no matter how many times I tell him he doesn't, he refuses to return to what he was saying. So I choose to move on.

Claire felt a couple of tears roll down her cheeks as she read her boyfriend's interview. She couldn't believe how much he remembered about the first time they had met. As she continued to read, comments he made such as:

"I hadn't realised just how incomplete I felt before we got together. And I know that sounds tacky, but it's true. There's just this crazy level of love, respect, and understanding that we have that I've never experienced with anyone else in my whole life."

and

"Claire is the strongest person I have ever met. To go through everything she has and to come out the other end as determined and beautiful as before just makes me more and more proud to be her partner in life."

Claire looked up at Owen to see him looking over at her with a smile on his face. She knew how much he loved her because she felt the same love too. Even almost five years on she felt as safe and loved as she had done at the beginning. "Owen I…" but he was quick to respond,

"Have you got to the bit where she asks me about marriage?" And Claire shook her head, looking down at the interview, her heart beginning to race as she frantically continued to read. Then her eyes caught his quote, and she held her breath:

"If I'm honest I can't imagine my life without Claire. So yeah, when I find the right time and place, I will definitely ask her to marry me. But only when it feels right" and it doesn't feel right just yet? "I know that for the next couple of years I'll be tied up with the Raptor attraction and Claire will be busy running the park, but that's not to say the right moment won't appear. I love her and I know she loves me and that's really all that matters."

Claire kept her eyes on the magazine but stopped reading, a small smile creeping on her face as tears slowly continued to fall down her cheeks. He wanted to marry her. And he'd publically said it. This magazine was being published all over the world. Her sister would buy it and read it. His family would buy it and read it. Her bosses would buy it and read it. There wouldn't be a person in the world soon who wouldn't know his intentions.

"Claire, I think I knew from the very first time I saw you that you were the one. There was just this feeling that you gave me that nobody had ever given me before." Claire looked up from the magazine, tears still slowly rolling down her cheeks as she stared at the man beside her. She couldn't imagine him saying anything more wonderful than he had already said before, but he was giving it a good go, "And during those early days, with that nightmare of a first date," Claire let out a giggle beyond her tears, "or the time you came to pick me up to take me to the I-Rex paddock. Yeah I made things difficult for you, and I'm sorry…"

"I know you are" Claire found herself whispering as he continued to speak.

"…but really it's because you blew me away and I was frustrated because I couldn't get to the real you. From the first time we met, and each time I saw you after that, even when I was frustrated or angry with you, you still blew me away." She felt him take her hand and give it a small squeeze and she tried to stop the tears from rolling down her cheek. But she couldn't. Everything he was saying was perfect. "Claire, the moment I first saw you I fell in love with you, and I'm fairly certain I've been in love with you ever since."

"Only fairly certain?" Claire asked, a teasing grin on her face and her heart rose as she heard Owen let out a little laugh.

"Well we did have a few moments back in 2015 when we didn't get on." Claire thought back and he wasn't lying, there was once a time when they would absolutely infuriate each other. He had always thought he was right, and she had always been adamant that she knew more than he did. "But my love for you was still there, it was just a little covered over with my stubbornness." Claire let out another giggle and nodded. "And the night after we got off the island. That was definitely one of the best nights of my life. It was then I knew that from that moment on, no matter where I went or what I did, I would feel incomplete if I wasn't with you."

Claire found herself shaking her head slightly, tears still rolling down her cheeks, and before he could say anymore she brought her hands to his cheeks and kissed his lips firmly with hers. She sat up, swinging her leg over his lap so that she straddled his waist, and the couple parted, gasping for air as they looked into each other's eyes with smiles on their faces. "You're one of a kind Mr Grady." Claire said in a teasing tone and she watched as he leant towards her, glazing his nose softly against hers, and her smile softened, her voice becoming a whisper, "I love you."

"I love you too" she heard him whisper back with a smile, and the couple's lips reunited.


	30. Gloves & Groggy Whispers

Claire stepped out onto the back porch of her house, the mild morning air running over her skin as she lifted a glass of cool orange juice to her lips. She adjusted her dressing gown so the cord wrapped tighter around her waist, and she stretched a little, having had a rather uncomfortable night's sleep. She pulled her cell phone out of her robe pocket and checked the time. Eight o'clock. She had just over an hour before she needed to be at the new improved Raptor Paddock to pick up Nathaniel in time for Owen and Blue's very first public 'performance'. Ever since the magazine interview had been published a few weeks ago, Claire had begun going over to the paddock to see the progress of Blue's training as there was no longer a need to hide her relationship with Owen. The Raptor had certainly become impressively attentive and to her initial dismay Owen had revealed that it was mostly thanks to their young son.

Claire stepped out of her car, gently letting the door click behind her, knowing better than to slam it shut and potentially distract the dinosaur within the paddock. She was here for two reasons: partly professional, partly personal. On the professional side she needed to take a tour around the paddock that was apparently 2/3rds of the way refurbished, ready for approximately 500 members of the public per performance, 3 performances a day, beginning next month. On a personal level however she was excited to see what her son and boyfriend got up to when Owen took Nathaniel to work with him.

Claire made her way across the relatively new tarmacked path that lead from the new large car park a fair distance from the paddock, and she arrived at the base of the paddock. She had to admit, it looked brilliant. Different, but not so different from how it had once been that it would affect the Raptor. Well that was the hope. Claire walked around the edge of the paddock and could hear Blue inside, running about. The park manager stepped through a large metal door that had a large sign hanging above it that read 'Raptor Range – Entrance' and began walking up a large flight of stairs. Impressive photos and paintings of Blue littered the walls either side of the stairs. Once Claire reached the top she stepped out onto the 'auditorium' and let out a little gasp as she marvelled at the view from the seating area down into the pit of the paddock. She had left Owen with the responsibility of going over the plans for the refurb, and agreeing to whatever he had decided was best for the paddock, and she was pleased she had. It certainly was a treat to be able to watch Blue scampering about after a live pig that squealed as it ran for its life.

Claire's eyes were drawn to the bridge that ran from left-to-right across the paddock. Stood in the centre of the bridge, looking down at the dinosaur, was Owen, with a grin on his face. And beside him, stood on a small set of wooden steps, was her little son. The boy wore a bright blue baseball cap that bore the Jurassic World logo, and a red t-shirt that read "My Mommy's the Park Manager" on the front. Seeing them both together on that bridge filled Claire with joy as she heard her son chatting away to his father, the man responding where necessary. From the looks of things neither Grady had noticed that the female member of their family had arrived at the paddock. Claire noticed that Blue had appeared below the bridge, calling out to the two humans above her. The woman watched as Owen yelled a command at the dinosaur, to which the animal obeyed. Claire let out a smile as she saw the joy on her boyfriend's face, a smile that grew further when she heard her son yell a loud "Well done Blue!" to the creature in the pit below them. The smile quickly faded though when she saw her little boy delve into a bucket hanging off the bridge beside him, and pull out what looked like a dead rat. Her stomach flipped so quickly that she didn't have time to be impressed with her son's aim as the little boy threw the rat over the bridge railing and down into the dinosaur's mouth.

"Owen!" Claire found herself yelling out in shock, her voice sounding far shriller than she had intended. It was due to the surprise of what she had just witnessed. Her voice echoed around the new venue, and she watched as her boyfriend and son looked up quickly. The moment they saw her in the auditorium Owen's smile faded, and Nathaniel squeaked her name from across the paddock in excitement. Several members of the raptor team were scattered about in the 'wings' of the paddock, and there were some members of the construction team stood at the far end of the auditorium, all of whom turned to look at the Park manager, but she didn't notice them.

Within minutes the woman had dashed out of the auditorium, down the stairs, and across the entrance of the paddock. She swiped her ID badge and entered a door marked 'Staff Only' before storming up a set of metal stairs. The area stank of dirt, poo, and what could be dead rats, but Claire didn't care. She arrived at the top of the stairs and began marching across the metal bridge that hung over the paddock, her heels clicking with each pace. She saw Owen quickly stand up, hiding something behind his back as Nathaniel ran over to his mother with delight.

"Mommy you're here! Did you see? Did you see me feeding Blue?" Claire picked her son up as he arrived at her feet and she balanced him on her left hip as she glared at her boyfriend. Owen looked at her as though he was a kid that had been caught with his hand in the cookie jar.

"Yes," Claire said with a sharp tone, "I did see you feeding Blue." She slowly made her way up to Owen, stopping a foot away from him. She was feeling angry. Not furious. Just angry. Why was he allowing their son to feed the Raptor? Actually, more to the point, why was he allowing their three year old handle dead rats? He had mentioned to her once that Nathaniel threw rewards down to the Raptor on occasion but had failed to mention they were dead rats! Didn't he know how dangerous that was?

"Look Claire, I was going to tell you…" Owen began but the woman cut him off right away, "What were you going to tell me Owen? That you're using our son as part of your performance? Or that you're letting him handle dead rats?" Her chest was heaving and her eyes glanced at his waist, wondering why he had his hands behind his back. Her stomach dropped and her mind started fearing the worst. Had he given their son his very first pen knife? To perhaps slit the rats or something? She looked back up at Owen's face and saw him swallow loudly, "What's in your hands?" she asked coolly.

Claire watched as her boyfriend let out a disappointed sigh, and brought his hands out in front of his body. She looked down to see a pair of small latex gloves, all scrunched up. Claire hesitated, her eyebrows raising slightly and her expression relaxing. It definitely wasn't a knife. "Gloves?" she asked in surprise. That was far from what she had envisioned Owen to be hiding behind his back.

"Well, yeah," Owen responded. She watched as a small grin peered out in the corner of his mouth and he furrowed his brow slightly, "Hang on a minute, what did you think I had in my hands?"

Claire could feel her cheeks flush red as she began to feel embarrassed. She had been so shocked at seeing her three year old son handling a dead rat that it hadn't occurred to her he may have been wearing a protective layer whilst doing it. She shrugged, "I don't know. A knife or something."

"You thought I had given our son a knife?! Claire he's three!"

"I know, I know…" Claire said with an ounce of irritation to her voice. She knew she was wrong, but she wasn't going to admit it. So what if she didn't know how the process of feeding the Raptor was like nowadays, the fact of the matter was that Owen had let their son throw dead rats into the paddock.

"Look, each time Nate comes here he helps me throw Blue's rewards…"

"I know" Claire said, looking at her son who had gone unusually quiet, clearly uncomfortable having to see his parent's bicker. They never talked like this in front of him, having always vowed to keep any of their disagreements away from the eyes and ears of their son.

"…we wash our hands thoroughly before we come up here, then we put on our latex gloves and train Blue. Then we dispose of our gloves and wash our hands straight after."

Claire continued to look at her son who was nodding at her as his father spoke. The little boy had sensed that his mother was angry and he looked up at her with a tinge of sadness on his confused face. She noticed that he had begun twiddling a lock of her red hair in his left hand. Claire never wanted to be the reason her son looked sad, she had just been scared, that was all. Her face relaxed completely, her voice softening, "Well…I suppose that is a good routine to have."

"Exactly. It's the routine we've had since he could walk."

Claire's face dropped at Owen's words and she heard him sigh as she turned her head to him angrily, "Since he could walk?!" She watched Owen hang his head with another sigh and she could feel her heart begin to race angrily, "Owen please don't tell me Nate was handling deadrats at one years old!" but she knew what his answer was going to be before she had even asked the question. It may as well have been rhetorical. She saw her boyfriend look up at her, his face screwed up slightly, and she rolled her eyes, "Owen!"

"Look I know it may seem bad, but Claire nothing has happened to him. Nate loves feeding Blue, don't you son?" Claire followed Owen's gaze over to the little boy in her arms and her face fell again. Nathaniel was still looking uncomfortable as he gave his mother a nervous nod. "He would've got so bored if I made him just sit and wait outside the paddock three days a week for two years." Claire was never going to admit it out loud, but Owen had a point. Their son was so curious and active it was highly likely he would have got into more trouble away from the paddock than inside it. So she let out a defeated sigh and gave her son a smile, which seemed to give Nathaniel enough confidence to smile again, and she gave him a big kiss on the cheek before turning back to her boyfriend.

"So what you're essentially trying to tell me is he's a mini Raptor trainer now huh?" she asked in a serious tone, but a smile crept onto her face as she saw Owen bite his bottom lip and nod. The sound of Blue echoed around the paddock and the little family peered over the railing of the bridge they stood on to see the Raptor stood below them expectantly. Claire let out a little sigh of defeat and turned to Owen who was already looking at her nervously, "She's waiting for you" she said, a small smile on her face as she looked down at their son. Nathaniel leant over to the railing and Claire allowed him enough space to grab the railing but held him tight. She noticed the dinosaur call up again, and the woman furrowed her brow as her son mimicked a little roar, which the dinosaur repeated again. As Nathaniel giggled, Claire turned to her boyfriend.

"What's going on?" she whispered to him.

Owen motioned to their son and the Raptor, "This is how they've been since the first day I brought him here," and Claire looked back down at her little boy and the dinosaur as Owen ended his sentence, "they've got a bond."

The back door creaked open and Claire looked over her shoulder to see her sister step out onto the porch to join her, also wearing a dressing gown and a sleepy grin on her face. Her sister had arrived yesterday, along with her youngest son Gray, who wasn't so young anymore. The boy was fifteen years old and had grown to be almost a foot taller than both his mother and aunt. Michael, Karen's fiancé, was away on business in Europe for ten days, and Zach was away at college, so Karen had decided to visit her younger sister and watch the grand unveiling of the park's latest attraction: Raptor Range. The two women stood side-by-side on the porch, both perfectly happy to feel the light warm breeze run through their hair as they looked out at the back garden.

"So I never got a chance to talk to you about Vogue," Claire let a smile grow over her face as her sister spoke. She could tell her big sister had been dying to talk to her about it. She had had missed call after missed call over the past few weeks since the magazine had been published, but she had been so tied up in trying to take care of her son along with trying to ensure the park was running well and that the latest attraction was gaining enough publicity that she hadn't had a spare minute in the day to call her sister back. Instead she had just been sending short emails.

"I can't believe Owen's going to finally ask you to marry him!" Her sister's tone was quiet, not wanting to disturb the silent atmosphere, but oozed excitement. Claire turned to her right with a small chuckle as she saw her sister look at her with a massive grin on her face. She had seen Karen beaming any time she saw Claire and Owen together. Whether they be holding hands, sat together, or even in the same room together. As exciting as it was to know that it would eventually happen, Claire wanted to be realistic.

"One day yeah." Claire watched as her sister screwed her face up briefly, but before she could say anything the red-head continued, "Karen, he and I will get married, and knowing that is good enough for us for now. But at the moment we have so much on with work and trying to bring Nate up that we don't have time to plan a wedding." Her sister seemed to look disappointed and turned back to the garden, but Claire continued to smile. Karen didn't get it. She knew she wouldn't. Her sister was one of those who thought people's lives were incomplete if they didn't have a relationship with specifics to it. Marriage being one of those specifics. They had a home, and a son, just not marriage. Yet.

"What time is the performance?" Her sister asked, changing the subject, and Claire took another sip before answering, "Ten o'clock."

"I'd better start waking Gray up soon then."

Claire watched her sister walk over to the back door. Gray's reaction when Karen had informed him he would have to get up at around eight thirty this morning had been quite a sight. The fifteen year old had moaned that he'd expected this time away to be a holiday without rules like a wake-up time. Owen had laughed and informed the teen that with his three year old cousin in the house he would be lucky if his wake-up call was as late as eight-thirty. Of course the man had been joking but Gray hadn't laughed. And as a result, Claire and Owen had worked really hard that morning to try to make sure that their overly-excited three year old did not wake Karen and Gray up at the crack of dawn.

Claire strained her ears, listening out amongst the darkness for the sound of her son's footsteps. She and Owen had decided to have Nathaniel sleep on the floor of their bedroom in his own little make-shift bed, making his own bedroom available to Gray , and the spare bedroom available to Karen. The problem was the three year old had been so giddy with excitement to see his aunt and cousin that it had taken his parents a long time to get him to sleep last night. Claire knew the moment he woke he would be desperate to go into the other bedrooms to see the other members of his family, having no concept of time, so she and Owen had agreed that he would go over to the Raptor Paddock early with his father to keep him from disturbing the rest of the house. Claire had woken when she had heard a shuffling noise coming from the little bed on the floor beside her and now she held her breath listening hard. The sound of more shuffling and some quick breathing could be heard and it was enough for the woman to know that her son was awake and getting out of bed.

"Nathaniel" she hissed in a stern but quiet voice, and the shuffling stopped. She peered through the darkness and could see the outline of her three year old from the very, very dim light of the pre-dawn sky that peeped around the blinds of the bedroom. He was stood up in his make-shift bed, and had frozen the moment he had heard the sound of his mother's voice, "what are you doing?" Claire asked in a softer tone. It took her all of her energy not to let out a tired groan as her son responded in a groggy, half-normal, half-whisper volume, "Nothing. I just…was going to see if Gray was still sleeping."

"Sweetheart it's still night-time. Gray isn't going to be awake for a long while yet." Claire whispered affectionately, looking over at the alarm clock on the bedside table beside her. It was four in the morning. Far too early for most but clearly not for her son. She peeled back her side of the bedsheets and motioned for Nathaniel to join her, "Come on. Come cuddle Mommy for a bit then it'll be time to get up." She watched her three year old rub his eyes with a big yawn and she knew he was still very sleepy. With any luck he would curl up in her arms and fall asleep again. Hopefully.

Nathaniel clambered into bed beside her and Claire tucked her knees up like she used to do when she would bring him into bed with her as a baby. The little boy lay facing her, his right hand affectionately, gently twirling a lock of her red hair between his fingers and she could hear his breathing begin to get heavy. She could feel Owen laying behind her, breathing steadily, and she was relieved their son hadn't woken him. The last thing needed was for Owen to be woken early on what was set to be the biggest day of his Raptor Training career. Today the auditorium in the Raptor Paddock was going to be filled with members of the public, journalists, and The Board of Directors. Claire was nervous for her boyfriend, but Owen had seemed to be relatively calm about it all. Just when she thought Nathaniel had fallen back to sleep he let out a little gasp followed by another set of groggy words spoken at a regular volume, "Mommy is Gray awake yet?"

"Not yet sweetheart" Claire replied with a quiet, sleepy mumble, having almost finally fallen asleep herself. The room went silent and she could feel her son was still twiddling her hair in his hand. After what felt like a long while, just when Claire thought her son had fallen asleep, he gasped and asked, "Is Gray awake now?" but in a slightly louder voice. Her response was the same, and the room fell silent once more. The next time it happened Claire had actually fallen asleep, and was woken by her son who had brought his hand to her cheek and was shaking it, "Mommy…" this time his voice was loud and Claire immediately shushed him, but it was too late. She felt Owen shift and turn his body weight in his space in the bed behind her, letting out a heavy sigh, before wrapping his arm around her waist and curling up to spoon her. She felt him pause for a moment, presumably feeling their son on the other side of her.

"What time did the little rascal wake up?" Claire heard her boyfriend mumble quietly behind her and she felt his arm begin to get heavy as he began to drift back off to sleep. "About four" she mumbled back to him, her eyes still closed, her son having thankfully given up shaking her cheek, and had returned his hand to the lock of hair that now hung down at her chest.

"What time is it now?" her boyfriend mumbled again and Claire reluctantly opened one eye to peer at the clock. "Four forty" they still had about another hour before Owen had to get up and ready for work along with getting Nathaniel ready too. She felt her son sit up and clamber over her, his fingers still accidentally entwined with a lock of her hair and she winced as he tugged it while he moved. She pulled her hair from his grip, and just as she did so his right knee dug into her hip, his left into her breast, and she gasped as her rough-and-tumble son clambered over her, "Owww!" she winced, and she felt her son being sharply dragged off her body by Owen who told the three year old off in a stern whisper, "Nate what have we told you about climbing over people? You have to ask first!" Claire massaged the sore parts of her body and looked to her left to see that their son now lay between his parents, and his father had sat up to tell him off, "Now you hurt Mommy just then. What do you say?"

"Sorry Mommy." She heard her son say sincerely, his volume still relatively loud for that time of the morning. She felt him turn to her and she let him give her a cuddle. Claire smiled as she kissed the top of his head. No matter how many times he did something naughty it was always accidental, particularly if he hurt her by clambering over her. Often enough he forgot that he wasn't a baby any more. In fact Claire had to admit that she forgot it sometimes too. If she ever got hurt because he dug into her at the wrong angle it was mostly because she let her three year old son do it in the first place. Claire scooped her son up in her arms and shuffled her body closer to Owen's letting him bring his right arm out so it lay underneath her head and pillow. A sleepy smile grew across her face as she felt her boyfriend kiss the top of her head, and she sighed happily as her son took hold of a new lock of her hair and began twiddling it between his fingers. Her right hand lay over her son's belly, her fingers entwined with Owen's left hand fingers. The couple and their son snuggled up together and when the alarm went off an hour later all three had fallen asleep again.

"You're alright that I go over to the paddock ahead of you?" Claire asked just as her sister reached the back door of the house and Karen peered over her shoulder with a smile, "Of course. It's no good leaving Nate with Owen during the performance. Who knows what'll happen!"  
Claire let out a small laugh as her sister stepped back into the house. The Park Manager turned back to the back garden and let out a small sigh. Today was such a big day, and even the calm morning atmosphere of Isla Nublar couldn't relax the nerves in her stomach.


	31. Commands & Scribbly Stick Figures

Owen sat on the edge of the wooden dock that belonged to the small plot of land that he owned around his bungalow. His feet swished in the warm lake water before him, and he placed his cell back in his pocket before reaching out and taking hold of his bottle of beer. Owen took a long swig of the alcohol, then took a deep breath, closing his eyes as he enjoyed the peace and quiet of the east-side of the island. There was a huge part of him that really missed living here. The peace and tranquillity. No risk of being interrupted by his family or neighbours. Being near water, whether it be here at the lake, or at the cove by the house, was his favourite place to be alone. He was happy enough to share those places with the people he loved, but when he needed some alone time to think without the stress of reality, he would come here.

Speaking of people he loved, the peaceful calm air was quickly broken as his cell chirped beside him, and he picked it up to read a reply from Claire: Everything ok? Xx

Owen took another deep breath, another swig of beer, then responded: Yeah, just need some quiet time. Will b home in a bit xx

He sent the message, and resumed his attention back to the scenery in front of him. He didn't often come here after work, he normally dashed home to get the dinner sorted before Claire got home from work. But today her work had been with him. Mainly to oversee the preview performance that he and Blue had done at the new Raptor Paddock along with dealing with any questions or issues that may have arisen. He thought back on the day's events and couldn't believe how close it had been to a complete disaster. It had been the very first performance in the new Raptor Paddock in front of an actual audience. And not just any old audience, but in front of journalists, reviewers, and The Board of Directors no less. It had been his make or break moment. If anything had gone wrong he would likely have been fired. The thing was, to begin with everything did go wrong.

Owen froze, taking steady breaths as he heard whispers from the crowd within the packed auditorium opposite his position on the bridge. He stared down at his Raptor who had completely ignored his command. He knew why she was doing it. Initially he wondered if it had been because of the crowd. But really it was because she had already seen Nathaniel that morning. She knew the little boy was here, and because of that she refused to perform any 'tricks' that they had rehearsed over and over for the past few months until the youngest Grady joined his father on the bridge. Owen could feel a bead of sweat roll down the side of his face as he watched Blue call up to him, presumably calling for Nathaniel. He took a deep breath, and turned his head to his right. At the end of the bridge, just in the doorway of the paddock, he could see Claire stood with a look of fear and confusion on her face. She held Nathaniel on her left hip, having arrived thirty minutes earlier to take their son and clean him up a bit before the show, and to give Owen time to get mentally prepared. He could see Nathaniel asking his mother a question, also looking somewhat confused, but Claire didn't seem to answer.

Owen turned back to the audience and cleared his throat, his voice echoing around the paddock thanks to the microphone attached from his ear down to his mouth. "Erm…sorry about this ladies and gents. Blue's just a little nervous in front of new people." He used every ounce of his self-control not to look over at The Board of Directors who sat with their respective families on the front row of the auditorium. What they must be thinking now. He was so fired. Surely after this terrible performance he would be fired.

All of a sudden he heard a ripple of applause that quickly grew into a rapturous one. He noticed everyone quickly taking photos with their cameras and filming with their phones and he furrowed his brow, turning back to look at Claire to see if she knew what the audience could possibly be excited about. To his surprise he saw her slowly walking towards him, her right hand holding Nathaniel's small set of wooden steps, her left hand holding their son's hand, and their son wearing a small pair of latex gloves. Owen's heart skipped a beat as Claire arrived by his side, shooting him a wink as she beamed at him, before placing the wooden steps down beside him. Nathaniel was smiling excitably, bouncing up and down whilst looking from the audience, down to Blue, then up at his father. Owen noticed that the dinosaur had spotted the little boy too, and was now stood in the very spot they had trained her to stand on for each performance. The Raptor trainer let out a sigh of relief, his girlfriend bent down whispering strict instructions to their son to behave but to have fun, then with a quick kiss on both Nathaniel's and Owen's cheeks (the latter got several "Woo's" and wolf-whistles) he watched as Claire made her way back to the door of the paddock and waited patiently there for the end of the performance.

Owen turned back to the audience as his son steadily made his way up the small wooden steps beside him, "Well, as you can see ladies and gentlemen I struggle to get Blue to perform any tricks so I've had to have my son join me today to help out. So please give it up for Nate Grady." These words were enough to get the audience clapping again, and Owen felt his son step a little closer to him. Owen crouched down to his son's height, placed a hand over the microphone, and asked him if he was okay. The little boy smiled and nodded. "It's just like we've always done Nate, we're just getting Blue to do tricks and feed her." His son's smile grew and Nathaniel reached into the bucket between them, ready to throw a rat into the paddock. Owen gave him a wink, stood up straight, and held his arm up. The audience went silent as they watched the dinosaur below the bridge stand up straight, cocking her head slightly, waiting for the first command.

"Blue," Owen yelled confidently, "Eyes down" and he brought his hand down slowly. The dinosaur mimicked his movement with her head, and Owen clicked a clicker in his other hand. The Raptor looked back up to the bridge and the audience clapped as Nathaniel threw down a rat with a squeaky "Well done Blue!" Owen began to calm.

Owen stood up, stretching slightly before making his way back down the small dock towards his bungalow. He was pleased that Claire had insisted he keep the small property. He was even more pleased that they visited each Sunday to make sure the surrounding plants didn't get too overgrown and the bungalow didn't get too dusty. Owen stepped through the door of the small property, placing the empty beer bottle in the recycling, and smiled as he looked at the fridge in the kitchen beside him. On it were two pictures drawn by his son. One of a scribble in green and blue crayon. At the bottom were the words 'Blue drawn by Nathaniel – aged 18 months' in Claire's handwriting. He remembered that his son had drawn it one Thursday when he had gone into work with her. The other picture was more recent. A picture that Nathaniel had drawn on his birthday a couple of weeks ago. A picture that had forced himself and Claire to have had a relatively brief yet serious talk.

Toys and books littered the king-sized bed as Nathaniel eagerly unwrapped his final birthday present. "Colouring!" the little boy squealed excitably as he threw the blue wrapping paper on the floor and held up a big pack of colouring pencils. Owen was grinning whilst sat up in bed as his son sat on top of the covers in front of himself and Claire. The parents had anticipated an early wake-up call, and an early wake-up call they had been given. Nathaniel had been counting down to his birthday for days, excited about all the presents he would be getting, so it had been no surprise when they had heard his little footsteps thundering through to their bedroom from his. The look on his face when he had seen the giant box on the floor beside Claire had been priceless, and he had scrambled to pull out all of the wrapped presents inside, handing them to the woman who had placed them on the bed.

Now Nathaniel sat up eagerly as he watched his mother undo the packet whilst she told him to be patient. The moment she had freed the colouring pencils from the packet, he tugged them from her hands and chucked them on a spare bit of cover beside him, scrambling to grab the large sketchbook he had already unwrapped. Owen watched as his son opened the sketchbook in the middle before immediately picking up a green colouring pencil, his favourite colour. The father smirked as he sensed his girlfriend take a sharp intake of breath but instead of saying something she stayed silent. He could tell she wanted to tell their son to start colouring from the front of the book. Owen reached his right hand up and smoothed it across her back. He could hear her let out a sigh as she relaxed her shoulders and she leant back so she nestled into him. He brought his arm around her as she laced her right arm around his stomach and the couple let out a content sigh as they watched their three year old son draw a picture in his new sketchbook, his tongue sticking out in concentration as he switched between coloured pencils.

A few moments later Owen jumped, realising he had dozed off, and he opened his eyes to see a piece of paper half an inch from his face. "Daddy, do you like my drawing?" Owen saw the page was being moved away from his face as he heard Claire softly tell their son not to hold it so close, and Owen looked down at the drawing his girlfriend held in her right hand. He smiled as he saw a scribbly stick figure, with scribbly orange hair, and a scribbly light purple dress. Another scribbly stick figure stood taller beside the first, with scribbly light brown hair. And between the two scribbly stick figures stood the smallest scribbly stick figure, holding hands with the bigger scribbly stick figures, with scribbly blonde hair. All of the figures had big smiles on their faces. Owen grinned as he looked up at his son who was beaming at his parents in excitement. "See that's me, and you Daddy, and you Mummy" the little boy said as he pointed at each stick figure he'd drawn.

"That's really good son." Owen said with a smile, and he saw Nathaniel's eyes light up at his father's praise. The two Grady's returned their attention to the drawing as Claire brought her head up from Owen's chest to peer at the page, "Nate, who's this supposed to be?" Owen saw a green and blue scribble with two eyes and a smile. There was no mistaking who that was, "That's Blue" Owen said with a smirk. Their son's drawing wasn't that bad.

"I know that's Blue," Claire said with a nudge and pointed to a part of a scribbly tree that had been drawn, "Who's that?" she asked, and Nathaniel peered over the page to look. Owen squinted at the page a bit, and noticed that peeping out from behind the scribbly tree was another small stick figure. The smallest of all the stick figures on the page. This stick figure had a big smile on their face and scribbly blonde hair like the stick figure drawing of Nate, except longer. "That's my little sister" the three year old said, in a serious voice, as though his mother had been a fool for asking. Owen froze, his smile fading in shock as he looked down at Claire who had looked up at him. Her smile had dropped too and he stared at her, trying to read her mind. Was she pregnant?! If she was then how?! They had been so careful. At least, he thought they had been.

Nathaniel scrambled off the bed, grabbing his two new Star Wars action figures as he went, and ran off to his bedroom, leaving his parents to stare at each other in confusion. Owen glanced down at his girlfriend's stomach. "Stop it!" Claire said, dropping the picture and bringing her right hand under his chin to raise his face so he looked back at her, "I'm not pregnant!" Owen cocked his head and squinted his eyes at her, but she rolled hers with a sigh, "I'm not!" but he wasn't so sure. He watched as his girlfriend sat herself up to look at him properly, a grin on her face, motioning to the drawing, "Look, there's that family a few houses down. You know, the Taylor's?" Owen found himself nodding, but he was still in shock. Where was she going with this? "And you know how Nate is friends with their little boy?" She was right, their son had met little Toby Taylor last summer at the cove, shortly after the family had moved into the house who's long garden backed onto theirs. The Taylor's were their go-to family if Nate was in need of a playmate. Toby also had a little one year old sister, Lucy. Suddenly Owen understood what his girlfriend was hinting at. "Well Toby has a little sister. It's only natural Nate would want one too."

The room went silent as the couple looked down at the drawing. Owen felt a little uncomfortable. He wasn't ready to have another child in the house. Not only was Nate a handful but Owen remembered how much Claire struggled with her first pregnancy. He didn't want to think how much she would struggle with another. They already had the challenge of trying to juggle parenthood with their jobs. The new Raptor attraction was taking up a lot of his time, and there was still things to be done to the house. And while Cassie was great at taking care of their son every Friday and Saturday, there was no way they could expect her to take care of a baby too.

"So…do you…want…to give Nate a little sister?" Owen asked nervously. She had said in the Vogue interview last month that she had no wish for another child any time soon. As far as he had been aware they had been on the same page. But she had hesitated as soon as he'd said it. A hesitation that made his heart drop. A hesitation that was joined soon after by the words he had hoped she wouldn't say, "Well…yeah I guess…" Owen was preparing himself for an argument. There was no way they could possibly have another baby right now, no matter how much he knew his parents wanted them too. "…eventually, but…" 'But' was good. 'But' was always good. Particularly in this context. "…not any time soon." Owen breathed a sigh of relief, but he noticed his girlfriend had screwed her face up a little, "I'm sorry" she said quietly, as though she had said something to offend him. He smiled. Even after five years, hearing her apologies were rare yet always gratefully received.

"Don't be sorry. I feel the same." Owen said, motioning to the drawing with a chuckle, "Nate had me freaking out there for a moment."

"I was freaking out too!" Claire said before giggling. Her face had relaxed and she looked as relieved as Owen felt, "I mean, it's really sweet that he wants a little sister but…we can't have another baby yet." Owen watched her fall back into his arms, and the picture fell onto his lap as he held her tight, the couple giggling every so often as they thought about how odd it was of their son to be drawing his imaginary little sister.

"Urgh could you imagine how awful it would be for me to be pregnant this year?" Claire said in disgust, and Owen let out a quiet laugh, "Could you imagine how awful it would be if we had another child in the house? Another little thing to try to juggle work around" he said as he glazed his right-hand fingertips over his girlfriend's back thoughtfully.

"Exactly" she said in agreement. The couple lay together as the morning sun slowly began to rise, and light up the bedroom. Owen glanced at the clock hanging on the wall opposite the bed. It was almost six thirty. Not long until they had to get up and get ready to go to work. It was a Thursday, so Claire's turn to take Nathaniel over to the Hub with her. They had decided to keep Nathaniel's routine the same as it always was, with the only difference being that Claire had ordered a large cake to be delivered to the house, and Owen would get home in good time to make homemade pizza as a birthday treat.

Owen could feel his eyelids getting heavy as his felt the steady breathing of his girlfriend beside him, her arm on his waist having fallen heavy which told him she had likely dozed off. Suddenly their son came thundering through into their bedroom, clambering up onto the bed, and grabbing another action figure. It was enough to wake the parents up again, and with a small reluctant groan, Claire dragged herself out of bed to pick her son's outfit for the day.

Owen pulled the door of his bungalow shut, walked down the wooden steps, and over to his jeep. He was grateful to Claire for not nagging him to come home. She knew he needed some time away from reality, just like he knew she needed her own time away too. Hers was just tucking away in their lounge with a good book and a glass of wine. Owen clambered into his jeep, and began making his way home for dinner. Tonight would be the final night that he definitely had a job at the park. Tomorrow Claire would read through the reviews with her bosses, and find out whether the Raptor Ranch had a chance to be popular and successful enough to be continued. As a result tomorrow would mark the day that she would find out whether she would be able to keep the Raptor Training Programme running or shut it down. Owen was nervous. Very nervous.


	32. The Tree-House & Social Media

Claire sat with her legs crossed at the table of the pavilion, sipping a glass of wine as she looked to her left at two figures down the bottom of the garden. The moment they had got home a couple of hours ago Nathaniel had raced down the garden as fast as his little legs could take him, over the moon that his cousin had finally agreed to play with him. And Grey had followed closely behind him. The two were taking it in turns to scramble up the large tree at the bottom of the garden. At the top of the tree sat a large wooden treehouse that Owen had constructed last Christmas as a present for Nathaniel, and from that treehouse was a zip-wire that ran from the treehouse all the way over to a large pole beside the pavilion in the centre of the garden. The three year old and his fifteen year old cousin were taking it in turns to zip down the wire, and Claire grinned as she saw Grey land with a thud on the grass beside her.

"Having fun?" she asked him, to which the teen nodded with a chuckle, slightly embarrassed that he was in fact having fun. Claire's face fell as she saw her little son heading down the zip-line at speed, "Grey, look out!" but before the young man had time to react, Nathaniel slammed into the back of him. Claire saw her nephew drop to a heap, her son on top of him. Her heart was in her mouth as she quickly stood up to lean over the wooden balcony of the pavilion. To her relief her nephew and son began laughing loudly. The little boy stood up then grabbed the teen's arm pretending to put a lot of effort into helping him stand up. Grey got to his feet with ease. Claire was about to tell her son to apologise to his cousin, but to her surprise, the three year old immediately and sincerely said "Sorry Grey", before running off back over to the tree house. Claire stood, slightly shocked as her son's apology rang in her ears, over and over, in his funny little accent. It had been such an unusual day, and oddly enough this hadn't been the first time today that he had displayed behaviour that was rather mature for his age.

Claire's stomach dropped as she stared out from her position at the door of the paddock. The door that lead to the bridge. In the middle of that bridge, in front of her very eyes, stood Owen. He seemed frozen to the spot, staring down at the Raptor who was slowly pacing in the paddock below him. She had just witnessed her boyfriend call out his first command to the dinosaur, but for some reason the creature had decided not to respond. The auditorium out to her right was silent. So silent that, had it not been for the sound of the animal's feet and its odd cries, it was highly likely you could hear a pin drop. Her son, who she carried on her left hip, whispered into her left ear, "Mommy, why isn't Blue doing anything?" but Claire didn't answer. She couldn't answer. She had no idea what the answer could be! Whispers began to ripple across the audience as several of the members began to wonder whether this was a part of the performance, and Claire wondered what on Earth her bosses must be thinking right now. She had reserved the front row of the central tier for them and their families. They could see everything, which right now was the Raptor who was still pacing expectantly below Owen, who had now turned his head to his right and looked directly at her. Claire had never seen him look so afraid. Being in the public eye had never been his intention. Performing had never been his intention. Yet here he was, and unfortunately for him the performance wasn't going well.

She heard Nathaniel whisper into her ear again, "Mommy, can I go and help?" Claire was still unable to move, being so terrified for her boyfriend who had now turned back to face the audience. All of a sudden she could feel her son fidgeting in her arms, trying to pull himself off her hip and down onto the ground. She placed him down without thinking, her stomach flipping - the silence was deafening. Claire felt her son tugging her left hand and she looked down at him, letting him drag her over to a door opposite the door to the bridge. She furrowed her brow as he whispered for her to help him into the room, and her curiosity got the better of her. Pushing on the door, she and Nathaniel entered a dimly-lit room that had wooden crates on shelves inside. Claire watched her son march up to a crate and point at it, "They're in there Mommy." She furrowed her brow, not sure what the little boy was talking about, but she went up to the crate nonetheless, and opened it. Inside were all manner of overalls and protective clothing. Nathaniel pulled out a small plastic box which had his name scrawled on it in, what Claire recognised as, Owen's handwriting. She could hear her boyfriend speak into his microphone, his words echoing around the paddock and auditorium, "Erm…sorry about this ladies and gents. Blue's just a little nervous in front of new people."

Claire opened the small plastic box to see packets of latex gloves inside. Nathaniel immediately dove his hand in to pick a packet up and handed it to his mother, "Daddy says I always need to wear these when I help him with Blue." Claire didn't know what to say. All she knew was that right now Owen needed help. They couldn't leave the performance like this, and if she had learnt anything during the times that she had visited the paddock recently it was that the Raptor responded best to the three year old . Claire crouched down to look into her son's eyes, "Are you sure you want to help Daddy in front of all those people?" she asked seriously, and unsurprisingly he nodded with a big smile. So the red head quickly opened the packet and helped her son to put the small latex gloves on his hands.

As they walked towards the door to the bridge Claire spied Nathaniel's little wooden steps. She picked them up with her right hand then, with a deep breath, she stepped out into the sunshine and began walking towards her boyfriend in the middle of the bridge. She heard a rapturous applause while she walked, and she smiled as she saw the look of surprise on Owen's face as he watched her and their son approach him. Claire's heart hammered against her chest as she placed the small wooden steps down beside her boyfriend. This was it. If this idea didn't work then the Raptor attraction would be scrapped. Blue would likely be destroyed. Owen would likely lose his job. And the reputation of the park would plummet. It was now all down to her two boys.

"Did I just hear my son laughing?!" Karen asked as she joined the red head on the pavilion, a glass of wine in one hand, her iPad in the other. Claire grinned, returning to her seat as the two boys raced back to the tree house, "I knew Nate would wear him down eventually" she replied, taking a sip of her wine as her sister took the seat opposite her, sipping her own glass of wine. It was odd to think that a few years ago they were barely on speaking terms. They had only begun speaking again when Karen called Claire up out of the blue, in floods of tears as she revealed she was getting a divorce from her then-husband, the father of her sons. That was when Claire had suggested Zack and Grey come to visit the park. A visit that had turned into a disaster. It was hard to think back to that time because so much had changed since then.

Claire looked at her phone as it 'pinged' and she picked it up to see who the sender was. "That Owen?" she heard her sister ask and the red head nodded. He was at his bungalow. She swallowed rather loudly. The performance earlier that day hadn't had the best start, but thanks to their son it had gone relatively smoothly for the rest of it. Why was Owen over at the bungalow? He normally only went there when he needed time to think. So what was he thinking about?

'Everything okay? Xx' she sent to him, and twirled the device between her fingers thoughtfully, waiting patiently for his response. She was surprised he had replied so quickly in the first place, her boyfriend not being the best at technology, and she jumped as she heard her phone 'ping' again. 'Yeah, just need some quiet time. Will b home in a bit xx'

Claire let out a little sigh as she reached out and placed her phone back on the table.

"Trouble in paradise?" she heard Karen ask, and Claire shook her head with a forced smile. But her sister knew her better than that and raised her eyebrows as the red head took another sip of wine. The younger sister didn't care that her boyfriend was at the bungalow. She understood that he needed time to think. What bothered her was what he needed time to think about.

"Owen's just over at the bungalow. He'll be on his way back soon." Claire said as her older sister squinted her eyes suspiciously but didn't pursue the matter further. The sisters fell silent as they watched their son's clambering up and down the trees around the tree-house. Claire enjoyed watching her son play around. The sound of his giggle echoed around the garden and it filled her with joy to know that he was happy. That was what it was all about really. Making sure he was happy. Claire knew that at some point she and Owen would give their son a little brother or sister, but not until the parents felt ready. The funny thing was, in recent weeks it had been a topic that Nathaniel had spoken about an awful lot, and there was only so many times the couple could tell the little boy that he wasn't getting a baby sister any time soon.

Claire pattered through from the kitchen to the lounge in her bare feet, carrying some milk in a small plastic dinosaur cup for her son. As he sat on the floor on a cushion, watching the TV screen, she noticed there was a cushion beside him. She smiled, then walked over to the little boy, placing the cup of milk on the low coffee table in front of him, before sitting down on the spare cushion on the floor. Nathaniel let out a loud gasp, pushing against his mother's arm, trying to push her away. Claire was confused, and she gently rolled to her right, "What's wrong?"

"That's my sister's seat!" the little boy exclaimed and Claire froze. Had she heard him correctly? Did he say his sister?! She shook her head as though she had imagined it, and asked her son cautiously, "What do you mean your…sister?"

Nathaniel had resumed his attention on the television that was showing Star Wars VII, the movie that had been on non-stop since the almost three-year old had accidentally found it on a cable channel several weeks back. As a result he was now Star Wars obsessed, with Kylo Ren being his favourite character. Claire didn't get the obsession, nor the series, but Owen had informed her it was the best of the newest sequels. She really didn't care. Right now what she cared about was why her son had suddenly mentioned 'his sister'. She held her breath as her son began to speak slowly, his attention still on the screen in front of him: "You know Mommy. My sister. My little sister."

Claire's heart fell as she stared at her son, who sat forward and reached for his cup of milk, his eyes not leaving the screen once. She couldn't help the hand that automatically rose to her stomach, resting on the surface. She had heard stories of how women had found out they were pregnant because their eldest children had predicted it. Was this another one of those times? Was she pregnant again?! Claire suddenly felt sick. Oh God, what if she was? Nathaniel would be delighted of course but Owen? Owen would freak. He was stressed enough putting the final touches to Blue's routine without the additional stress of having to take care of yet another baby. And Claire? Well there was no way she could continue her job as Park Manager. Not with a very active young child and a baby. Missing out on two days of work was difficult enough. Having another baby would take her out of the running completely. And they wouldn't be able to move away from the island as that would mean leaving Blue, which Owen and Nathaniel would both be unhappy about.

Claire stood up with a worried sigh. She had a spare pregnancy test hidden in the bathroom from the pack she had bought 3 years ago when she had been in denial about being pregnant with Nathaniel. It was now taped under the sink in the hope that Owen would never find it and worry. Now it was her turn to worry. She had walked no further than two footsteps away when her son slowly piped up again, "Noah said that all little boys get little sisters. I'm a little boy Mommy, so I'll get a little sister." Claire breathed a sigh of relief. So that's where he got the thought from! One of his little friends from the small neighbourhood they lived in had a little sister who had recently turned one. There was no need to panic.

"Right, well...best not mention that to Daddy okay Nate?"

Claire watched as her son nodded before taking another gulp of milk, watching the only film that managed to occupy his attention for a long time. She hoped he wouldn't mention anything to Owen. She wasn't pregnant, and there was no need to be giving him reason to believe that she was. For now, it was best to go upstairs and do the test, just in case. And so Claire quickly made her way up the stairs and into the bathroom to see where hers & Owen's fate lay.

"So I've been looking on some social media sites" Claire rolled her eyes at her sister's words. Social media. Both friend and foe. Friend because it was not only the way she was able to keep up to date with what her sister and nephews were up to without having to see them all the time but it was also the best way to communicate with park guests/future visitors. Unfortunately social media had also played its part in ridiculing the park if some rides were closed for the day, or if a visitor got 'heat stroke' and lost a court case because it hadn't been the park's fault.

"It turns out you and Owen have become something of a power couple. People are obsessed with you two!" The look on Karen's giddy face was a sight. The woman was clearly thrilled about all the romantic attention her little sister was getting. But the red-head's face opened up into a huge smile,

"What people?" Claire laughed. People were not obsessed with them! She would've known about it before now if so.

"The general public, the media!" Karen exclaimed, half surprised half exasperated that her sister hadn't heard about it before. It was all the women in the office at her new workplace had been gossiping about for weeks. She hadn't had the guts to tell them the woman they were gossiping about was in fact her sister. "They've dubbed you Clawen!"

Claire giggled again at how absurd what her sister was saying, "Clawen? Wha…? Like Brangelina?!" Karen nodded with a grin, looking at something on her iPad, and Claire screwed her nose up, "That's crazy!"

"I know but it's true! Have a look for yourself." Karen thrusted her iPad over to her little sister and Claire took it, half dubiously half curiously. Sure enough, there on the screen was a photo of herself and Owen, in an artsy panoramic picture that had been crafted by someone, with a title over it in block capitals saying Clawen: the Official Fansite. Claire found her cheeks flushing in embarrassment as she began scrolling down the page. The top 'news' item was of a photo of herself, Owen, and Nathaniel, stood on the bridge over the Raptor Paddock a couple of hours ago. Below the photo was a block of writing written by someone who seemed very excited that 'Claire and little Nate actually made an appearance!" The photo had obviously been taken by a member of the audience at Owen's preview performance, but the knowledge that this photo was now exposed to the world made Claire feel very uncomfortable. Especially as it had her son in it. Who knew what sort of people were visiting this website? And the way the author had written the quick review of their experience was as though they actually knew them, when they really didn't. Owen was going to freak.


	33. Hashtag Clawen

Owen crept from the bathroom through to his bedroom at the end of the landing, doing up the button of his pyjama bottoms that Claire had bought him specifically to wear if guests were staying overnight. He was used to walking around and sleeping in his boxers when it was just the three of them. He gently pulled the door of the bedroom, letting it close with an almost silent 'click'. Owen peered at his son who lay sprawled on his little make-shift bed on the floor beside Claire's side of the bed. The three year old was breathing heavily as he slept, his leg hanging off the side, his little arms up over his head. The father smiled. Grey must have really worn Nathaniel out earlier when they had climbed trees.

Owen looked from his son, over to his girlfriend, who sat up on her side of the bed reading something on the screen of her iPad with a small smile on her face. Her long red hair was up in a messy bun, the freckles on her makeup-less face noticeable from the light of the screen she held in front of herself and the twinkling fairy lights around the bedroom. She had recently invested in a pair of glasses that she never wore out of the house and only ever wore if she was reading something on the screen at night. Owen had to admit, they made her look extra sexy.

Her focus was interrupted by a small groan from their son, who had begun to wake up and had groggily called out for his toy. Owen watched as his girlfriend slowly placed the iPad down beside her, on the side that he normally slept on, and swiftly pull her glasses off her face as she eased herself over the edge of the bed. She reached down to the miniscule floor-space between her and their son, and wrapped her fingers around a small soft cuddly dinosaur toy. A toy that Nathaniel had cuddled to go to sleep with since he had been born. She brought the toy over to lay on the three year old's chest and the little boy immediately brought his hands up to cuddle it tight. Nathaniel groaned groggily again, though kept his eyes shut, and Claire hushed him back to sleep as she affectionately brushed back his blonde hair from his forehead. Owen made his way around to his side of the bed as his son fell asleep again, and he crawled under the sheet to sit up beside Claire, who had resumed her position, sat up reading her iPad.

Owen had to do a double-take when he saw the photos over her shoulder. Claire was on a site called Instagram, whatever that was, and on that site she seemed to be browsing through thousands of photos. The top of the page read "#clawen", and all of the photos seemed to be of her. And him. And their son. Either separately or together.

"What are you looking at?!" Owen whispered as his girlfriend pressed a thumbnail on the screen. She didn't respond at first, instead bringing the iPad up closer to her face and inspecting the photo on the screen. Owen saw it was a photo of her kissing him on the cheek, but where it had been taken he had no idea.

"This site, or app, or whatever it is, it has a lot of photos of us on it from today…" His girlfriend whispered slowly as she cocked her head slightly, continuing to inspect the photo. What did she mean photos of them? From his first Raptor performance?

"Why of us though? You were only on the bridge for a minute. If that!" Owen exclaimed, as his girlfriend pulled the device away from her face and down onto her knees that she held halfway up to her chest. She hushed him as she realised just how loudly he had spoken and she motioned to the floor beside her side of the bed, where their son thankfully still slept.

"Well according to Karen," Claire whispered, "the general public are pretty obsessed with us." Owen snorted, thinking how ridiculous it sounded that anyone could be obsessed with them when they were nobody's. Nobody knew them properly. So how could they be obsessed? His snort had been enough for Claire to go onto google search, "I know. I didn't believe it at first either. But then I typed Clawen into Google."

"Clawen?"

"It's a mix of my name and yours. Like Brad and Angelina became Brangelina…" Owen looked at his girlfriend blankly. He had no idea who these people were. He watched as Claire typed Clawen on the iPad, then suddenly thousands of results came up on the screen. The top bar had a few 'images', then there were 'articles related to', then some websites with titles specifically stating they were 'supporters of Clawen'. The images immediately available were two from the Raptor Performance earlier when Claire had arrived on the bridge, of the front cover of Vogue magazine that Claire had been on, and one of the photos from inside that issue of Claire and Owen with Nathaniel.

Two of the first 'articles related to' were of a Buzzfeed article with the title 'Why Clawen Is Every Girl's Dream Relationship.', and an article by The Daily Mail entitled 'Big things for Jurassic World – The Park's Power-Couple See To It That Raptor Ranch Is The Hottest Ticket On The Planet' with an accompanying photo of Claire kissing Owen on the lips whilst holding their son by the hand. Owen furrowed his brow. There was no way people were allowed to do this. Surely.

He watched as his girlfriend pressed on a website entitled 'Clawen: A fan site shipping Claire Dearing & Owen Grady' and his heart raced a little with worry as the site loaded. What was it going to say? He calmed a little as he saw the picture at the top of the screen with the title of the website on it. It appeared to be an arty montage of himself and Claire, photos mostly pulled from the Vogue Magazine, some were from the press conferences Claire had had to attend in the past, and a couple were from court trials they both had had to attend years ago. Owen couldn't believe the effort that someone had put into making it. "Pretty cool, huh?" he heard his girlfriend whisper to him.

"Yeah," he replied, unable to tear his eyes from the montage, "a little weird…"

"Entirely weird!" Claire responded with a little giggle, "but cool" and Owen nodded, his face relaxing from that of shock into a small smile as his girlfriend scrolled down the page a little. There were a collection of photos that were titled Raptor Ranch and Owen reached out to press the title. The page disappeared and opened out into a new page. There were hundreds of thumbnails. Some grainy, as though they had been taken from a low-spec camera, and some were very high-res, all taken from someone in the audience earlier today. They started from the top of the outside of the Raptor paddock, then as Claire slowly scrolled down there were noticeable shots of Owen in the thumbnails. Before long there was a figure with red hair in the thumbnails, and Owen pressed one. It just so happened to be the one of Claire kissing Owen while she held their son by the hand. He hadn't realised that he had brought his hand around her lower back as she had kissed him, but he had been in such shock that she had come over to him that he wasn't really sure how much of the whole performance he remembered. He peered at the photo further, noting just how happy their son looked. That was good. That was the whole point of life here on the island, to ensure Nathaniel was happy. Owen smiled as his eyes returned to his and Claire's faces in the photo, their lips against each other. He had always known they looked good together, but he had never seen a photo of them kissing before. Their lips seemed to match perfectly, despite it having been such a quick kiss. He could feel Claire leaning herself into him, and he put his arm around her as she leant against the side of his torso, the iPad still in front of them as she moved on to the next photo.

"You're sure I look okay?" she asked for the millionth time, and Owen rolled his eyes with a sigh. He stood near the front door of their house, dressed in a smart pair of navy blue chinos and a white shirt, looking at Claire who now stood at the bottom of the staircase. Her long red hair was down and she had styled it with loose curls, and she wore a flowing green summer dress which she had managed to find online four days ago after she had had a little breakdown because none of her 'nice dresses' fitted her anymore. He hadn't overly helped the matter when he had tried to reasonably tell her that now she was seven months pregnant not a lot would be fitting her.

"You look amazing." Owen said honestly, walking over to her slowly with a proud smile on his face. She really did look amazing, especially as she had had little to no sleep overnight because she had been feeling so uncomfortable. At least that was what she had told him, but Owen really knew that it was because she had been worried about today. Today was a big day for them. Owen's mother and step-father were visiting for the first time. Visiting not only the island for the first time, but also meeting Claire for the first time too. And Claire was nervous.

"What if they don't like me?" she asked, looking down at her baby bump, before looking into Owen's eyes, tears glistening as she bit her bottom lip nervously. Owen couldn't believe that she was worried his parents wouldn't like her. How couldn't they? She was beautiful, charming, enthusiastic, and great at conversation. So he shook his head with an encouraging smile.

"Not a chance. They're going to love you!" Of course they were going to love her. His mother already loved her and the women hadn't even met. He remembered how excited his mother had sounded on the phone when he had called her two Christmases ago, apologising that he wouldn't be able to visit for Christmas because he had returned to the island and, yes just as she had asked, he did have a girlfriend and they were living together on the island so were going to celebrate there. His mother had then been a million times more excited when he had called her at Christmas just gone to apologise again that he wouldn't be able to visit for Christmas but that he was also calling her to inform her that she was going to become a Grandmother. That had been the ultimate cherry on the cake for Elizabeth Grady, who had been desperate for one of her sons to have a baby so she could be the Grandmother she always knew she could be. Since then the woman had called him every couple of weeks to find out how the pregnancy was going, to find out how they were coping, and to discuss the best time for her and her husband to come and visit. So they had decided the best time for the impending Grandparents to visit would be in time for the Park's grand re-opening, which was tomorrow.

A car pulled up to the front of the house and Owen felt his heart begin to race as Claire's face fell. They had sent for a car to pick the Grady's up, Owen wanting the first time his parents met his girlfriend to be somewhere that Claire would feel as comfortable as possible. The problem was, Claire was beginning to panic a little. He noticed her chest as rising and falling rather quickly as she glanced over at the front door of their house. "Hey" he said, putting his arms around her waist as best as he could and he saw her face return to look at his, "Everything's going to be okay" and he leant down to give her a kiss on the lips. He felt her arms wrap around his neck as she kissed him back. There was a lot of him that wished they could hold onto this kiss forever, the feel of her arms tightly around his neck making him feel so wanted. Their kiss was broken as they heard a knock on the front door, and Owen felt his girlfriend take a deep shaky breath. He took her hand and the couple walked over to open the door. There stood his mother on the front wooden porch of the house, his step-father stood just behind her, and two large suitcases beside them.

The older couple beamed at the younger couple, and Owen could feel Claire grip his hand tightly as his mother broke into a huge smile and threw her arms around her son's neck, "Oh my boy, it's so wonderful to see you!" the woman pulled away from Owen, placing her hands on his arms to take in all his features that she hadn't been able to see in person for a couple of years, "Still as handsome as ever" she gushed, standing a good foot shorter than the younger man. Owen smiled. His mother always had been the best at greetings. She was very affectionate, and was never afraid to pull someone into a big hug, no matter how well she knew them. And as such, he watched as his mother turned to Claire who stood beside him, and said hello, "I'm Elizabeth"

"Claire" Owen heard his girlfriend say, but before the red head had chance to say any more, Owen's mother had pulled the woman into a big hug. He saw Claire smile as she looked up at him and he could do nothing more than give her a wink and a grin. His mother let his girlfriend go, and the older woman brought her hand up to Claire's cheek briefly, gushing about how beautiful the young woman was. Owen could swear his mother had tears in her eyes but he couldn't be sure, as she motioned to Claire's baby bump, "And my goodness I've never seen any woman look so well at seven months pregnant!" The woman pulled Claire into an excitable hug again, which gave the red head a cause to let out a small giggle at Elizabeth's kindness and affection.

"Alright Lizzy, put the poor girl down." Owen heard his step-father say with a chuckle, and Owen turned to the man who had been like a father to him since he had been a teen. "Good to see you son" Jim Grady said with a smile, and Owen hugged him tight. His mother had married Jim two years after Owen's father had left the family, and as an ode to the kind man Owen had chosen to change his surname to Grady via deed pole, as had his brothers. Jim Grady was family. His true father. The two men watched as the women parted, and Jim stepped up to Claire, hugging her gently to ensure he didn't squash her belly, "Lovely to meet you Claire," he said once he had stepped back to join his wife, "I'm Jim".

The next set of photos on the website were of Nathaniel, stood on his little wooden steps, taking out then throwing frozen rats down to Blue. Owen began to feel uncomfortable. These photos hadn't been taking by any member of their family. It had been taken by a member of the general public. A stranger. He felt his girlfriend shuffle her weight a bit and she spoke quietly as though she had read his mind, "I don't like that people are taking photos of our son." Owen agreed, as he watched her continue to flick through the photos. Some were great action shots of himself and Nathaniel during the performance. He felt proud that he was able to work with his son, and they really did look like a great team. But there was also something so unnerving that anybody had access to these photos. Yes it had been a public performance, but Owen felt like his family were private to him. "What are we going to do?" he heard her ask, and he watched as she sat up properly, placing the iPad on the bed, "I mean, I'll find out tomorrow if The Board wants to continue Raptor Ranch. If they do, do you think Blue will be able to perform without Nate there?"

Owen looked away from her concerned expression trying to imagine what his raptor would be like without the three year old that she appeared to have such a connection with. The idea of his son not being there was a rather terrifying thought, as he hadn't had a successful practice with Blue without Nathaniel there before. She may have misbehaved because she had already seen the little boy first thing that morning. But he couldn't be sure. "I have no idea. Maybe? If she got used to him not being there?"

"Yeah but what about Nate?" Owen watched as his girlfriend turned to look down at their son who slept beside her, "He's never known a time when he hasn't gone to the paddock with you." Owen peered over her shoulder at their sleeping son. He looked so peaceful. Banning him from the paddock would be such a huge change for the three year old, but right now that seemed to be what the parents were hinting at. If Claire could negotiate the opening date of Raptor Ranch with The Board then Owen would have enough time to train Blue to obey his commands without Nathaniel with him. If she couldn't negotiate the opening date then Owen would only have three days to try to work something out in time for the opening performance on Friday. As for childcare, Karen and Grey were on the island for the rest of the week to visit the Park, and it had originally been planned that they would take Nathaniel with them on a couple of the days too. But what would happen with childcare for the foreseeable future Owen had no idea. It all hung in the balance of Claire's meeting with The Board tomorrow. There she would be fighting for the Park, for Owen's career, for their family-life, and for Blue's life. A terrifying prospect in itself.


	34. Kitchen Antics & The Compromise

Claire's voice stuck in her throat as she sat in one of the meeting rooms of the Control Centre building. She was sat opposite her four bosses. The Board of Directors. Yes they had put her in charge running the Park a few years ago. Yes they had valued her opinion on most decisions in the past. But this year was different. The moment they had found out that she was in a relationship with Owen, the Senior Raptor Trainer of Jurassic World, it was as though they presumed any opinion she had about the Raptor paddock, the Raptor within it, or the Raptor's trainer, she would be saying that opinion selfishly. Today was no different. Claire glanced over at the clock hanging on the wall to her right and let out a small sigh, before looking down at the table in front of her. On the table were several photos. Some were of her, some were of Owen, some were of Nathaniel, and some were of Blue. All of them had been taken yesterday, either by members of the audience or the Park's official photographer, and were all from the Raptor Ranch Preview Performance. The point The Board had been battling to get through to her for the past thirty minutes was that this was what was getting the public talking. A family working together to train a dinosaur. It was what people were beginning to see as an additional incentive to visit the park, and in particular the latest attraction: Raptor Ranch. The problem was Claire didn't want to be in the limelight for the sake of being 'the girl', or as one of her bosses had put it "the love-interest" of Owen's. That wasn't who she was. To the general public, she wanted to be what she was, the Park Manager. The Vogue Magazine article had been about her and how she was a working mother, and how Owen was her love-interest. Worse yet, The Board were now trying to convince her that her son should be a permanent part of the show.

"The little guy was great! He was charming, and confident, and polite. The perfect representation of someone who works at Jurassic World!" said Tim, and his colleagues beside him nodded in agreement.

Claire's heart was beginning to race. No matter how many compliments they threw at her about her son, there was no way she was making Nathaniel a performer at a theme park. "That may be so, but he doesn't work at Jurassic World." Her blood was beginning to boil and to her dismay she could feel her cheeks flushing red in frustration. It was difficult enough at times being the only woman in these meetings, without the struggle of looking flustered in front of them. The room fell silent once again. A couple of the men looked over at a wall to her right, which had a website projected onto it. The website was a review from today's edition of The New York Times, the main photo on the page being one of Owen, Claire and Nathaniel on the bridge at the beginning of the performance yesterday. The other two members of The Board chose to look at Claire, who had now looked back down at the photos.

Seeing that look on her son's face in the photos steadied her heart-rate slightly. He was smiling in each photo. Not the nervous smile he gave when he met new people that he wasn't keen on. He didn't look uncomfortable or scared. He looked happy to be there. Claire remembered that no sooner had the performance finished Nathaniel had ran off the bridge and straight into her arms, asking her over and over if she had seen what he and his Daddy and Blue had just done in front of all those people. And she had answered over and over that she had seen all of it. The three year old had been thrilled. He had been so happy. Happy that, not only had he been able to help his father when he had been initially told that he wouldn't be allowed, but that his mother had also been there when normally she didn't have time to stop and watch their rehearsals all the way through.

"Maybe we can compromise in some way?" Richard suggested. Claire hated that word. What would she have to sacrifice in order to come to some sort of agreement? She sat up straight, pulling down her black suit-jacket, smoothing down the front as she reluctantly looked at her bosses. They all looked as frustrated as she was. That was the problem with their important meetings, they usually took a long time because Claire was strong. She had overheard them once say that she was 'difficult' and 'spoilt', but she had chosen to ignore them. It was just that she knew what she wanted, what was best for the Park, and unfortunately for them they didn't like to be told 'no'. She said nothing, and instead let out a small sigh, waiting to hear their suggestions.

"What if your son took part in only three of the performances a week?" Claire squinted her eyes at the first suggestion. They were still insisting her son perform. That wasn't what she was going to agree on. No matter how hard they pushed. "And what performances would they be I wonder? All three performances on a Monday? Or the three out of four performances on a Friday?" she had a sarcastic tinge to her voice but she didn't care. The men in front of her shuffled uncomfortably in their seats, all looking over at Richard, the head of The Board, who looked at her. Richard cleared his throat, "Actually, we mean three days. So…"

"Nine, maybe ten performances a week?!" Claire raised her voice as she spoke and her words echoed around the spotless meeting room. She didn't care. She was outraged that they would dare suggest such a thing, "So child-labour, is that it? Not a chance Richard."

"You yourself said that the animal doesn't perform well unless he's there" Daniel, the member sat to Richard's left, protested but Claire could feel her heartrate begin to increase rapidly, her anger beginning to pulse around her body as the man continued to speak, "What would you rather? The attraction be a huge success and your son only being involved a couple of days a week? Or the attraction failing because the animal isn't performing and has to be put down?"

Claire paused. They had her there. She knew that they knew that by mentioning the fate of the Raptor they would tug on her heartstrings. Putting Blue down would not only upset herself and her little family, but it would also mean Owen no longer had a job. He wouldn't want to work at the Park if he couldn't train Blue. She now needed to be very careful with what she said. If it had been about six years ago she would have bulldozed her way through this meeting, insisting that it was her way or the high way. But then, if it had been six years ago she wouldn't have had anybody else to consider. Now she was mature. Now she was a mother. She had both her young son and her boyfriend to think of when battling The Board, not just herself. So Claire took a deep breath, cleared her throat, and spoke confidently, not wanting to reveal that she was a little afraid of the road they were beginning to go down, "So, what do you suggest we do?"

The men sat opposite her looked surprised at her mature reaction, and Richard straightened his tie, "We change the frequency of the Raptor performances. Monday, Wednesday, Friday. Every week. Your son's only needed three days of the week. The rest of the time is up to you." Claire remained silent, her thoughts racing as she tried to envision what her son's routine would be like with this proposal in place. She and Owen had worked hard over the three years that their son had been alive to ensure that he had a strict routine that wouldn't unsettle him despite being in what would be regarded to most as an unsettling environment. She had heard Owen talk about how well behaved Nathaniel was any time the young child was at the paddock with him, but their son had a little temper on him if he was ever asked to do something that he didn't want to do. What if something like that happened during a performance? Or even between performances? She could only imagine the stress Owen would have if he had to not only mentally prepare himself for the next performance but to also have to try to tame their son too.

"You've all got kids, right?" Claire said, to which the men all nodded, their expressions unreadable. The Park's Manager continued, hoping that by including their families she could get them to see this from her perspective, "Then you know what it's like trying to take care of a three year-old, its challenging." a couple of the men sat in front of her furrowed their brows but they all nodded in agreement. There was no denying that three year-olds were a challenge, "Mr Grady has a lot to do to prepare for a performance with Blue, so doing all of that whilst taking care of Nate is too much. Whether we put on three days of performances or just the one."

Her heart rose as Richard nodded slightly. Were they agreeing? Were they about to agree to keep her son out of the performance? She froze though. For some reason the three other members of The Board turned to Richard in nervous anticipation, "We were actually going to suggest that you are there to take care of your son between performances." Claire's stomach dropped, "We've noticed that you haven't been as involved with the Park as you once used to be. It's near impossible to contact you before 8am or after 5pm on any day." So she insisted on getting into the office at 8am? That was only because she wanted to have breakfast with her son and boyfriend each morning before work, and she usually wasn't able to leave the office until 5.30pm nowadays so they seemed to be exaggerating. "You don't respond to our emails as quickly as you used to." Claire's thoughts immediately turned to so many occasions on a Sunday when she had been halfway through responding to an email when her son would ask her a question or was about to fall off something. "You refuse to hold any meetings on a Thursday." Thursday. The day she brought her son into the office with her. Which The Board knew about! What did they expect her to do? Bring her three year-old into the meeting with her?! No chance. He would drive them all nuts. Claire knew she had changed her expression so she was looking more defensive, but rightfully so. She was a working mother. She was still working full time along with trying to bring her child up. She dedicated far more time and energy than she should on ensuring the Park ran smoothly…

"We've been in talks with your second in command, Melanie," There it was. Tim had just said the very thing Claire had been suspicious about since Melanie had been hired by The Board, behind her back, a few years ago. She had been hired as her second in command little more than two months after she had told them she was pregnant with Nathaniel. Yes, Melanie had been helpful, both when Claire had been struggling to physically get around to all the attractions before the Park had opened, along with getting to all the meetings with investors and The Board because she had been so heavily pregnant. Then Claire had taken six months off to care for Nathaniel after he had been born and phased her return to work a following two months after that before returning to full-time hours. Thankfully Melanie had been on hand to over-see the smooth running of the Park and keep her up to date with a weekly email every Sunday during Claire's maternity leave. Now, three years later, and suddenly The Board's true intentions were beginning to appear, "She knows how to run this Park, how to run a team, how to maintain the staffing and visitor levels. She does a good job taking care of the Park when you're not here at weekends." Claire was beginning to get annoyed. She had insisted on working the weekends to prove that she was pulling her weight, but The Board had insisted harder that she have it off as 'family time' while Melanie took charge. In the end they had come to an agreement that on Saturday's she would work from home. Now they were using it as ammo against her. "We were thinking, if you took Monday's, Wednesday's, and Friday's off to take care of your son between Raptor performances then Melanie could keep the Park under control."

Claire furrowed her brow, an action that seemed to have made the men in front of her retract a little in their seats. She could tell it had been a plan that had been in the works for longer than the past hour they had been sitting in here for. They had been waiting for the perfect time to strike. It seemed that that time was now. "So…you're trying to tell me that you want your Chief Parks Manager to only work Tuesday's and Thursday's?" Her voice was cold, disapproving, and uninviting.

"And Saturday's…from home of course." Funnily enough that input from Marcus, the quietest of her four bosses, didn't help things, "You would have the chance to spend more time with your son. That's what you want, right? That's what we would want. That's what any parent would want." Claire looked down at the photos in frustration. She had to hold her tongue. She had to be patient. They had been trying to get her to step down for years, and she had clung on stubbornly. She heard Richard clear his throat again but she didn't look up, "Claire, if you agree to this change then it would be in the best interest of the Park. It would be in the best interest of the asset. It would be in the best interest of Mr Grady. It would be in the best interest of your son."

Claire paused with a smile on her face as she stood in the kitchen of her home, listening to her son chatting excitably to his grandparents who he sat with outside, on the wooden porch at the back of the house. Jim and Liz Grady had travelled all the way down to Isla Nublar to celebrate Nathaniel's third birthday and the little boy had been thrilled to have been taken out for the day by his grandparents, to visit all the small family-friendly attractions down the south of the island while his parents had both gone to work. It had been odd to go into work on a Thursday without her son for the first time in two years-or-so, but Claire had managed to leave the office early to pick up a marvellous birthday cake that she had ordered for her son. She now stood before a large Star Wars cake, which had a model of a dinosaur on the top, just as the three year old had requested.

Claire delicately placed three candles into the cake, and just as she leant over the counter to reach for the small box of matches, she felt a familiar tall body press himself against her from behind. She grinned, standing up straight as she felt one of Owen's hands snake itself around her waist, the other cupping her left breast. His lips planted on the nape of her neck as he kissed her hungrily. Yes she had managed to leave work early to pick up their son's birthday cake, but she had also rushed home, knowing that Owen would be there waiting for her. They had arranged first thing that morning to take full advantage of his parent's babysitting their son, and so the moment Claire had entered the house she had flung her arms around Owen, who had been waiting patiently for her return. The couple had wasted no time in hurrying up to their bedroom, kissing every possible bit of each other's flesh, tugging at each other's clothes, desperate to dive into bed together. Sometime between the couple's exhaustive activities in bed, closely followed by the shower, Owen's parents had returned home. It wasn't until Claire had heard her son yell a greeting to her boyfriend, who had innocently ran downstairs in just a clean pair of boxers to grab a glass of water, followed by giggles from Owen's parents, that Claire realised they had returned home. She had sheepishly arrived downstairs twenty minutes later after drying her hair, putting light make-up on and getting dressed. Fortunately both Jim and Liz had been discreet, saving the embarrassment of Claire and Owen. And as such, the younger couple's passion had been reignited once again, with flirtatious glances, and the odd touch here-and-there. Now Claire could feel a fire burning in her stomach as she could hear Owen whispering breathlessly into her ear about how much he wished they were back in the shower together again. The passion was immediately cut as their son's voice loudly rang around the kitchen, "Wow! Is that cake for me?!"

Claire grinned as Owen let out a quiet, disappointed groan and cleared his throat, removing his arms from her body and stepping to her right, his front against the oven to hide the front of his pants from view. She peered over her shoulder at their son who stood at the open door of the kitchen, his green eyes wide like saucers as stared in wonder at the large birthday cake that his mother now carried in her hands. "It is! So go and sit with Grandad and Grandma and I'll bring it out!" She watched as her son let out an excitable squeal of delight, turned on the spot, and raced out of the kitchen. Claire turned to Owen who was looking at her hungrily and she leant her face towards his, her nose no more than an inch from his, "You should light the candles," she started in a quiet, sultry voice, "You're better with your fingers than I am." To her delight Owen groaned again in desperation at her seduction and she giggled as he reached out to grab the matches to light the candles. She loved to wind him up sometimes.

Ten minutes later and the family were sat together on the porch, Nathaniel happily inhaling his second slice of cake. Claire had a feeling it would take a long time for him to get to sleep tonight. Jim and Liz had just finished telling a story of how the little boy had insisted they buy a child in the queue behind them an ice cream because she had looked sad, "He's got a smooth way with the ladies, that's for sure!" Jim said with a laugh, and Owen leant over to his son, holding his hand up. The little boy high-fived it automatically with a grin, before continuing to eat cake. Claire couldn't take her eyes off him. It was hard to believe that it had already been three years since she had given birth to him. Three! She could remember a time when she had come to the sad conclusion that she was never going to have kids. She thought it had been impossible. Not only physically but also because she had never imagined that she would find a partner that she would feel so happy and comfortable with. And loved. But she felt so loved with Owen. She saw her boyfriend look at her with a grin and she grinned back. This year would be their fifth year together. Five years! A month before they had started their relationship someone would have had to have paid her a lot of money to even spend an hour one-on-one with the man. Now no money in the world could tear her apart from him. He was her other half. The half that made her feel whole.

"That ice-cream was the best ice-cream I ever tasted!" Nathaniel said with a wide grin, "I'll take you there tomorrow Mommy." Claire furrowed her brow slightly. Tomorrow was Friday. She had work on Friday's. There was no way she'd have time to take him to the ice-cream parlour on the south-east side of the island, especially around midday, the time that Cassie normally met her with Nathaniel for lunch. Tomorrow Jim and Liz were looking after Nathaniel again, and the grandparents had decided to stay at the house to fish and build sandcastles down at the cove while Claire & Owen went to work. "Sweetheart, Mommy's at work tomorrow. Remember?" to her dismay her son's face fell.

"But…you never go to work on Saturday." the little boy said in his odd little accent. Claire's heart lurched, realising that because Nathaniel had spent the day down the south of the island with his grandparents, much like he normally did on a Friday with Cassie, he had presumed today was Friday.

Claire's voice was soft and tinged with disappointment, "Sweetheart, tomorrow isn't Saturday, it's Friday. Mommy has to go to work on Friday's." Her stomach fell as her son screwed his face up and began to get teary. He jumped down from his little seat that he had been sat on between his grandparents, and raced around to his mother. Claire pushed her chair out a little as her son arrived beside her and she reach out to pull him up onto her lap. There she felt him wrap his little arms around her neck and she slowly rocked him back and forward as she gently smoothed her left hand across his back. Her heart broke as she heard him cry. She hated having to leave him to go to work. He normally didn't react like this and that was because he either had an exciting day planned with his Daddy at the Raptor paddock, or he had the day with her. This sort of reaction was exactly why Claire & Owen had maintained such a strict routine, to try to avoid upset like this. "Mommy, don't go to work. Stay here with me!" Claire could feel tears well up into her own eyes so she clenched them shut, softly hushing her son who had now found a collection of her red hair that hung down from her head, and was clutching it in an attempt to sooth his upset, just as he had done as a baby.

Claire froze as she stared at one of the photos in front of her. Nathaniel. Her little boy. He had been so happy during the performance, and thrilled to see her immediately afterwards. If she agreed to this new arrangement she would get to be with her son for five out of seven days of the week. She would get to see Owen far more, because she would be based at Raptor Ranch three days a week to take care of their son. The Ranch that was actually only about twenty minutes from their house, so there was no reason why she couldn't take the three year-old home between performances to give his Daddy the chance to get organised for the next performance. Yes, it would mean that she would essentially be stepping down as Chief Parks Manager, but hadn't that been her intention eventually? Battling against these four men every time she came into work had been exhausting. It would be a bit of a relief to let go of that stress. But then…the house. Her house, her car, all of it came with her job. If she didn't have her job then what would happen? Could she come to some sort of arrangement too? A bribe if you will. Like, if she stepped down they had to let her keep the house. That sort of thing.

Claire looked up at the men sat in front of her, and she suddenly saw them in a new light. As though they soon wouldn't be her problem, "So…you're saying I should step down…" she maintained her stern expression and tone. Richard, however, looked surprised at her presumption, "Oh no," he said quickly, "think of it more as, stepping to the side and letting Melanie join you. You both do such a good job at maintaining the park it would be a shame to let one of you go." Claire couldn't believe her ears. After all these years of trying to get her to step down, now they were telling her that that wasn't what they wanted? It certainly solved her 'how to keep the house' problem for now, "Besides, while you're working in the office on Tuesdays and Thursdays, you're technically working out in the field by taking care of your son at The Raptor Ranch on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. We can't have you quitting on us, Claire."

Claire couldn't believe what she was hearing. So, they were essentially paying for her to stay at home and take care of her child for three out of five of the days that she was at work. They did realise this, right? "So we have a deal? You'll let your son accompany Mr Grady for three days of performances: Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays."

Claire cocked her head suspiciously, speaking slowly so they heard every word, "And those are the only three day's you will insist the Raptor perform on?"

"You have my word" Richard nodded seriously, "Mr Grady can take the Tuesdays and Thursdays off to take care of your son if necessary." It all sounded a bit too good to be true. Perhaps this was how desperate they were to see that Raptor Ranch be a roaring success? Yes she would miss her time here at the hub of the Park, but she wouldn't miss so many meetings like these. And she wouldn't miss out on her son's childhood as much as she had already. This was why she had valued her career so much, to gain respect from her peers, to be successful, and to one day be in the fortunate position that she was in now, where she could swing certain things in her favour because she was a valued member of the company.

"Alright," she agreed, and she watched as her four bosses breathed a sigh of relief, "but my pay-cheque doesn't change," Richard nodded, "I get to remain in my house," nods all-round, "and you push the opening date of the Raptor performance back a month." She knew this would be a lot to ask, but it had been one of the only things Owen had asked her to use her position to push for.

"A whole month? Claire, we have sold tickets for the end of the week already!"

"And the audience would be disappointed with what they see. Believe me when I say this, that animal is not ready to perform yet and neither is my son, nor Owen. Give them one month to perfect it. One month, then enjoy the positive reviews that are bound to come flooding in. Because you and I both know that reviews are what makes this Park a continuing success." She knew she had persuaded them the moment she had finished her final sentence. Reviews were everything to The Board. It took her a ton of self-control to not fist-pump the air in celebration when Richard sighed heavily, before nodding, "Alright. You and Mr Grady have one month to get this asset into perfect shape for performing, otherwise we'll have to terminate it. We can't have visitors getting their hopes up unnecessarily." Claire rejoiced in her head, but she maintained her composure, revealing a strong smile between pursed lips, and giving a curt nod of the head. While this meeting hadn't gone exactly as she had first planned, things were still going in her and her family's favour. For now.


	35. The Blue Ceramic Mug & A Bad Temper

Owen slowly walked backwards through the open heavy metal gate, his eyes not leaving the Raptor that watched him curiously as he exited the paddock. He clicked the small device in his hand twice then breathed a heavy sigh of relief as the gate closed in front of him and the dinosaur let out two short roars before scampering off into the overgrowth behind her. She wasn't entirely untrainable, she just didn't do the 'tricks' that he had put in the performance programme without Nate there. Owen had just had a relatively productive couple of hours with the dinosaur. The Senior Raptor Trainer made his way out of the back gate of the paddock and over to the small building that still served as his office. He passed two of the Raptor assistants on the way, not that he noticed. Owen pushed the door and automatically held it open. But there was no sign of his three year old son, who usually dove into the office and straight for the packed lunch his mother sent him with. Today was Monday, yes. But it was also the first day of a whole new routine for the Grady family.

The early morning sun shone between the blinds, and Owen stirred reluctantly. He could hear Claire, who was snuggled up in his arms, groan drowsily as they both felt their son scramble up onto their bed and plonk himself in the tiniest gap between them. The gap was so tiny that before long Claire had scooted away from Owen to make way for their son, who was already too alert for the time of morning it was. Owen reluctantly opened his left eye and jumped as he saw his son stare at him, his large green eyes mere inches from his face.

"Morning Daddy!" his son said loudly, breaking the silent atmosphere around them, to which Owen heard his girlfriend hush their son. The little boy whispered a loud apology to his mother before turning his attention back to his father, "Daddy I can come to work with you right now if you want?"

Owen and Claire had already explained to their son on several occasions over the past five days or so that he would not be spending entire days with Daddy at work anymore. Instead, on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays Mommy was going to look after him, and he was allowed to go to help Daddy three times on each of those days. Then on Tuesdays and Thursdays Daddy would look after him while Mommy went to work. On the weekends Nathaniel would be able to spend the time with both his parents, neither of them having to go to work. Nathaniel still struggled to get his head around it and Owen could see why. For the past three years the little rascal knew nothing beyond the routine that he and Claire had strictly stuck to.

When Claire had returned home from her meeting with The Board last Tuesday, she had apologised that she had been unable to stop Nathaniel from being involved in the Raptor Ranch performances, but instead had come to an agreement where they all worked less and could spend more time together as a family. He knew she had been put in a difficult position. That she would have been given the option of saving the performance and thus saving his job and Blue's life, or keeping their son out of the public eye and risking them all losing their jobs and Blue having to be put down. He was grateful to her for coming to a relatively good agreement. Nathaniel loved being at the paddock and working with Blue, so Owen figured it wouldn't do him too much harm to be involved in three forty-minute performances a day over three days of the week. And the bonus was Claire was likely to be less stressed because she wouldn't need to go to the office as much anymore.

"Nate, we've told you already," Owen said groggily, "you can't come to work with me all day."

"But I'm already dressed!" He heard his son pipe up, and Owen opened his eyes as the three year old stood up on the bed. The kid wasn't lying, he had managed to find the pair of cargos that his mother had left out on a chair ready for the morning, and he now wore them with the button undone. He hadn't quite mastered the art of doing his own buttons up on his cargos. Nate had also managed to put on the t-shirt Claire had left out for him too. He stood with a big expectant grin on his face, his hands each clenching a small plastic toy dinosaur. He was definitely ready. "You did good getting dressed son, but I still can't take you to work with me like we used to." He watched his son's smile drop and Owen immediately felt guilty. If he could have it his way, he would take Nate with him to work every day, for the whole day, just as he always had before. But Claire had been right, if they were to change his routine to co-inside with the Raptor Performances that began in four weeks' time then they would have to start now.

Owen reached up and invited his son to give him a cuddle. The three year old laid back down on the bed, wrapping his little arms around his father's waist as best he could, and giving him a tight hug, "Mommy will bring you over to me and Blue later in the morning." Owen said, kissing the top of his son's head just as the little boy shuffled so he laid on his back between his parents. Owen felt Claire move closer to them, bringing her right arm over her two boys and the father looked from his son up to his girlfriend whose face was now only a couple of inches from his. He could see her give him a reassuring smile, tinged with a small dose of guilt, and he understood why. Neither of them wanted to upset their son, but sometimes changes had to happen, and it was best they did now before it was too late. Owen leant forward and planted a quick kiss on Claire's lips before resting his forehead against hers and closing his eyes. The parents let out a heavy sigh as they lay peacefully together on what was the first morning of a new chapter in their life, whilst they listened to their son chat away to the two plastic dinosaurs he held above his head.

Owen felt numb with sadness as the lack of his son's presence was even more noticeable in the quiet office. So far he had treated today like a Thursday, the weekday that in the past Nate had never been at work with him. It still didn't make things any easier though. Owen made his way over to the coffee machine, reaching out and grabbing his mug as he walked past his desk. He looked down at the ceramic in his hand, grinning as he saw a photo of his son on the side of it, beaming whilst laying on the floor of the porch at home. Beside the little boy was a giant poster with "Best Daddy" painted onto it, which Nate pointed to in the photo. He remembered when he had received it for Father's Day this year, and his son had revealed just how terrible he was at keeping presents a secret.

Owen stepped through the front door of his house having just returned from feeding Blue her breakfast. It was the first Sunday in a long time that Nate hadn't gone with him, but to his surprise the little boy had been sound asleep when he had got home from his early-morning run, and still asleep when he left the house again to go over to Raptor Ranch. Clearly turning three a few days ago had taken its toll on the little boy. From the sounds of things the three year old wasn't asleep any more though, and Owen grinned as he heard Nate yell his name excitably from upstairs. He could hear Claire speaking to their son from one of the rooms, but the little boy had clearly ignored his mother and come thundering down the stairs with one arm still out of his t-shirt, and his socks in his hands.

"Happy Father's Day Daddy!" the little boy squeaked as he ran into his father's open arms and giggled as Owen immediately threw him up into the air. The hug between them was brief as the three year old wiggled out of the Senior Raptor Trainer's arms, but before the little boy could run off Owen called him back. Nate obliged curiously, but Owen merely helped his son get his arm in his t-shirt, followed by helping him on with his socks. The father looked up as Nate scrambled to his feet and saw that Claire had just arrived at the bottom of the stairs with a smile on her face. She was wearing a yellow dress which had white daisies on it, that stopped just above her knees. Her red hair still flowed just below her shoulders, though it was getting noticeably longer which Owen loved, and she pushed her hair back with her hand as she began walking over to him. She planted a quick kiss on his lips and Owen reached out to hug her, but to his surprise she placed her hand against his chest, pushing him slightly, "Not until you've changed your clothes" he heard her say with a teasing grin and Owen looked down at his t-shirt. Sure enough, the once white t-shirt was now grubby. He had no idea how it had got like that as he had only been at the paddock for thirty minutes, if that. He always rushed Blue's Sunday morning feed so he could immediately get back home to his family. Sunday's were usually the day they headed over to his bungalow.

A large thud was heard from the kitchen and Owen heard Claire let out a short groan as their son let out a little "oops" before appearing at the kitchen door with a guilty expression on his face, " Er , Mommy? I dropped Daddy's present." Owen chuckled as he heard his girlfriend let out a little sigh with a small grin and shake of her head, before making her way through to the kitchen. Meanwhile Nate scooted back over to his father, who had walked over to the bottom of the stairs, knowing better than to stay in grubby clothes for too long in this house. "Daddy guess what I got you?"

Owen grinned as he sat on the bottom step of the staircase while his son shifted his weight from one foot to the other excitably as he waited for his father to guess. It was hard to believe that the little monkey had been up most of the night, hoping that for every time he went into his parent's room they may just get up and he could finally give the 'super-secret present' to his father. Owen heard his girlfriend yawn quietly from the kitchen and he felt guilty. Their son had disturbed them seven times through the night, something that hadn't happened that many times since he had been so much younger, and despite Owen's best efforts at offering, Claire had insisted on taking Nate back to his bedroom every time to get their son back to sleep. Now she was exhausted and Owen looked up to see her walking back through to the lounge, holding a relatively small square box that had been wrapped in blue wrapping paper. She wore a tired smile on her face, and Nate squealed in excitement before dashing over and taking the present from his mother's hand. The present seemed far bigger in the three year old's hands, as he marched up to his father and handed it to him "Happy Father's Day Daddy! Here's a mug I made you."

Owen chuckled as he noticed his girlfriend roll her eyes with a shake of her head before putting her head in her hands, "I'd worked so hard at making sure he didn't tell you!" she said with a small groan but Owen didn't mind. He unwrapped the present and pulled out from the box a blue mug, with a photo on the side. The photo was of Nate, pointing at a poster that had the words "Best Daddy" written on it. It was the best present he could've ever received for Father's Day.

Owen smiled as he placed the mug on the work-surface of the tiny kitchen area that had originally been botched together back when the building had first been built nine years ago. Claire had visited the building on several occasions a few weeks ago, begging him to allow her to speak to one of the Park's accountants so they could finance a new kitchen area for the Raptor Team, but he had insisted she didn't. And in true Claire fashion, she had ignored him, choosing to organise the finance and design of a brand new kitchen area for the Raptor Team without his 'permission'. So now Owen stood in a very bright, clean, small kitchen, pouring a jug of hot coffee into his Father's Day mug. He smirked as he remembered Claire stating sarcastically that their son would likely need a tetanus shot before stepping foot in the little kitchen. His heart leapt as he heard the distinct sound of his son's voice approaching the building, talking at speed and excitably in his little New York/Californian accent, and as Owen made his way out of the little kitchen he saw Nate bounding through the front door of the building and into the office. The little boy had a massive grin on his face, his eyes lighting up as he saw his father, running as fast as his little legs could carry him. Owen swung his son up into his arms as soon as the little boy reached him and in an instant Nate Grady began giggling and talking quickly about how excited he was to be back and how he had missed his Daddy and Blue and couldn't wait to start helping again.

Owen chuckled, putting his son down and telling him to pick out his gloves, before turning to Claire who stood in the doorway with her arms crossed and a smile on her face. She looked more tired than she normally did when she visited the paddock, and he wondered if it was because she was struggling already with the change in routine, despite it only being day one. "Hey. You okay?" he asked, walking over to his girlfriend who nodded with a small sigh, "Yeah. Sorry we're late. Nate couldn't decide what shoes to wear.."

Owen gave her a reassuring smile. He knew what that meant. Their son was very head-strong and stubborn. He could only imagine Nate kicking up a stink because the shoes his mother had picked out for him weren't the shoes he wanted to wear. Owen had to hand it to Claire, she looked great, if not a little too over-dressed for a woman who had just arrived so she could look after her son. She stood in white pants and a dark green floaty top, with sleeves that ended just above her elbows. She had put on her usual layer of pristine make-up that she normally wore for work. In fact, she looked like she was going into the office. Owen rolled his eyes at the realisation, and Claire had noticed, "What?" she asked defensively, and her boyfriend put his hands on his hips. "Why are you dressed like you're heading into the office?" he asked curiously.

"Today is Monday. I work Mondays…" he saw that his girlfriend had narrowed her eyes. She clearly hadn't liked his tone but he didn't care. He remembered the days when she used to wear jeans and a strap-top and be entirely content when coming to work at the paddock five years ago when they had been recapturing the dinosaurs and rebuilding the park. Back then she would comment on how relaxed she felt in that sort of attire. He knew she would feel far more comfortable in those sorts of clothes now and he wanted her to feel less stressed about this new routine.

"You take care of our son on Mondays, it's not like you have to work-work. You don't have to dress like that."

Owen closed his eyes with a sigh as soon as he had finished his sentence. Everything he had just said he hadn't said with the intention of offending her or telling her what she should wear. He was just giving her the opportunity to know that she didn't have to wear that sort of outfit when she was here if she didn't want to. But of course Claire's mouth had dropped open in horror at his words, and she unfolded her arms, pointing a finger at him as she stretched her head out towards him angrily, "I can dress however I like thank you very much!"

"I didn't mean it like that-"

But Owen wasn't given a chance to continue as Claire cut him off, with a loud angry voice, "And for your information taking care of our son is harder work than you would ever have to do!"

"I know-"

The couple froze as they heard somebody clear their throat from behind Owen, and the Senior Raptor Trainer saw his girlfriend's face drop in embarrassment as she looked over his shoulder. Owen followed her gaze, his heart dropping as he saw the figure of his best friend and colleague, Barry. Barry looked awkwardly at them and in his arms he held Nathaniel who looked rather shocked and upset as he stared at his parents. Owen immediately felt guilty. They had never bickered in front of the three year old before. Barry had heard them bicker all too many times, particularly before Nate had been born, when the park had originally been up and running. So perhaps his awkwardness was because he held the little boy in his arms?

"Nate, sweetheart, let's go over to the paddock." Owen heard Claire say calmly, and he watched as she marched over to Barry, plucked her son from his arms, and then walked out of the office without taking one look at Owen. The Senior Raptor Trainor and his colleague were left in the building staring at the red head in shock as she walked off with a purposeful stride, her son perched on her hip as she went.

"I see she still has a knack for losing her temper, man." Barry said as he joined Owen at the door of the office and Owen nodded seriously. She sometimes got like this. Immediately offended with what he said and so stubborn that she refused to let him explain. He would have to just let her cool off, and talk to her about it later. For now though they had no choice but to have to do the training with her and Nate still present. Owen looked to his right and there were a few of the paddock assistants smoking together whilst watching Claire approach the paddock, muttering to each other about something. He knew not many of them liked her, but it was tough. He loved her. She was the mother of his son. And his son was to be a part of the Raptor routine three days a week. So they would have to put up with her being around too.


	36. Caracolas & Betty Wilson

Claire stood in the kitchen, scraping the knife across the surface of the toasted bagel, spreading butter all over it. She grinned as she heard her son singing along loudly to the Star Wars theme tune which marked the end credits. It was only nine in the morning and the little boy had watched the whole film already. She thought it funny that once upon a time, back when Nathaniel was only a few days old, she and Owen had agreed that they'd try to keep their son's screen consumption to a minimum, especially as back in 2017 when he had been born everything seemed to be done digitally. Nowadays, not only was it done digitally, but most devices were high-res touch-screen. This often frustrated technophobe Owen who could never see the point in the need for so much technology, much to Claire's amusement. The parent's agreement to limit their son's screen consumption slowly began to disappear the older Nathaniel got. The more stubborn he got. The more fidgety he got. Now it was easier to stick the TV on so that Nathaniel ate his breakfast quietly while his parents had the chance to get ready for the day ahead. Now the three year old was a pro with the technology. He could work an iPad and his parent's iPhones almost as well as they could.

Claire made her way from the kitchen through to the lounge, carrying a small plate with the bagel on it and placed it on the coffee table in front of her son. Nathaniel Grady was stood on the couch, waving a toy lightsabre about to the beat of the music playing around the room from the TV, "Mommy can I watch it again?" the little boy said eagerly, his big green eyes pleading with his mother.

"Only if you eat your breakfast up please" Claire said, as she began to make her way over to the TV. Her son jumped down from the couch, picking up half the bagel which looked huge in his little hand, before jumping back up onto the couch, "Not on the couch please sweetheart" the red head calmly asked her son and the three year old obeyed his mother, jumping down off the couch yelling a loud "aaaaahhhh!" and landed on his feet, "crash!" before falling backwards onto his bum quite accidentally. There would have once been a time when Claire would've dashed to her son's aid, but since cutting down her working hours a couple of weeks ago and spending more time taking care of her son she knew that it wouldn't be the last time he would fall over from jumping off something. He had a huge desire for adventure and excitement. So Claire, having not heard any tears but rather a "whoops" from the three year old, restarted the film without looking over at her son who had begun leaning over the plate to eat his bagel. Suddenly the doorbell rang and Claire furrowed her brow. They didn't normally get visitors at this time on a Friday morning. The mail-woman came round about 8am but never rang the bell. If there were any parcels she would just leave them on the front porch with a nice note posted through the mail box to say that they were there.

Claire made her way over to the front door curiously, sucking a small blob of butter from her thumb, her bare feet pattering on the floorboards of the room. She peered through the tiny window of the front door and let out a small groan. It was Betty Wilson - the woman who lived in the house opposite them. She and her husband, Mike, moved into their small neighbourhood at the beginning of the year. Mike was the head of Jurassic World's merchandising, and Betty ran one of the small pubs along the docks. Both were in their late forties.

Claire opened the front door, pursing her lips into a tight smile as she reluctantly greeted her neighbour. Betty was a terrible reader of body language which both played to the Grady's advantage as well as disadvantage. "Good morning Betty. What can I do for you?" Betty was 5ft5 (around the same height as Claire), was rather plump, and wore thick rimmed red glasses that made her piercing blue eyes seem far larger than they actually were. She had dyed purple hair that she wore in tight curls every day, a thick layer of plum lipstick, and had a habit of wearing a horrid leopard-print shawl around her shoulders no matter how hot and humid the weather got. She stood on the front porch looking rather cautious and trying to peer over Claire's shoulder into the house. She had always been nosy, and a key spreader of gossip. Claire didn't really like her.

"Claaaaaaaire," the older woman drawled her greeting with a high sickly-sweet voice that rang right through the red-head's body. Claire watched the woman smile at her, "I was just wondering if everything was alright…you know…at home?" Claire furrowed her brow slightly, her tight smile beginning to drop. She had no idea why her neighbour was asking a personal question like this. It was none of the woman's business what was happening in her home. Had Nathaniel's noisy voice mixed with his crash on the floor really been so loud and sounded that bad that it warranted a neighbour to come over to see what was going on? The older woman continued, "It's just…well I saw you in a couple of magazines and…I was concerned."

Claire heard her son talking in the room behind her but she had become so used to him talking along with the movie or talking to his imaginary little sister that she didn't turn to see what he was up to. She raised her eyebrows with surprise and glanced down as Betty brought two magazines out from behind her back. The younger woman swallowed loudly, taking the magazines from the older woman's hands and could feel her heart-rate begin to increase dramatically as she saw on the front of both magazines photos of herself and Nathaniel from Wednesday of last week. The photo was of her makeup-less, looking particularly haggard under a large sun-hat, trying to hold her three year old up by the arm as he sat, in a strop, in a heap on the pavement. Accompanying the large photo on the front of one magazine was a large headline "Clawen No More? Claire struggles as her relationship breaks down" and in the bottom-right corner of the front cover was a smaller photo of a serious-looking Owen carrying Nathaniel down one of the streets in the park with a smaller headline in the style of a quote "Claire just works too much". The other magazine, which had a photo of the same situation Claire had been in with Nathaniel but from a different angle with her looking up at the camera with a stressed expression, had the headline "It's Over! Claire & Owen call it quits" and beside the headline was a small photo of her and Owen down at the docks clearly in a heated argument as the sun set over the ocean behind them. Claire stared at that particular photo in shock. When was that taken?! They hadn't been down to the docks in the early evening since before Nathaniel had been born. In fact, they hadn't been there since before they returned to prepare for the park to reopen. Claire's stomach twisted. She knew when that photo was taken. It had been at the end of her and Owen's fateful first date down at the docks, which had been…six years ago!

It was early afternoon and the hot Costa Rican sun was beating down on the streets below. Claire walked slowly down the pavement, her son walking by her side holding her hand. They had just been for lunch at Caracolas , one of few restaurants in Marpais where Nathaniel ate anything from the menu, and were now making their way back to the docks to get the ferry home to Isla Nublar . Claire had been given the day off as Owen needed an extra day to try a new trick with Blue, and while that had been no problem at all for Claire, nor her colleagues who had all seemed overly sympathetic and pleased when she had called them first thing that morning, it seemed to have confused Nathaniel. Thursdays had become his day off with his father and Owen had told Claire all about the restaurant over in Rica that their son seemed to love.

So she had decided to give it a go and to her delight he had eaten everything on his plate, a rarity for the fussy three year old. She had loved the way the waiters had greeted Nathaniel at the door like an old friend, taking them straight to the table that was apparently their regular spot. Claire wondered how often Owen took their son there and made a mental note to ask him when he got home this evening. Now, however, Nathaniel was beginning to get a little whiny. Claire sighed as she pulled his baseball cap further onto his head so it actually shaded most of his face. He didn't sleep much at the best of times, the last thing she needed was for him to get heat-stroke and not sleep at all. The three year old huffed and pushed his cap back up. "Nate, sweetheart, you need to keep your cap down. The sun is too hot." Claire said with a sigh, reaching out and returning the cap to the position she had had it at before. She herself had a large sun hat on to try to keep the rays from sizzling her porcelain skin. She knew it wouldn't completely work as there was rarely a day that went by when she didn't get slightly burnt. Claire looked up and thought she saw a glint of something across the road that reflected the sunshine but it disappeared almost as quickly as it had appeared so she ignored it and looked down again. Her son was misbehaving and had pushed the cap back up with such force that it fell off his head. It landed on the floor with a light smack as the peak of the cap hit the pavement and Nathaniel immediately stopped to look back at it.

Claire was getting to the end of her tether. Her son seemed to be going through a naughty streak in recent days. It was too much for the red-head and she dropped her calm voice for a far sterner one, "Nathaniel I told you to keep your cap down ! Pick it up please!" Unsurprisingly the three year old looked up at her with a face like thunder and yelled an angry "No!" to which Claire threatened him with no ice-cream - something she had originally promised he could have once they got back to Isla Nublar . This had been enough to crack the little boy, who collapsed in a heap on the floor and began fake-crying loudly. Claire could feel her cheeks flush red in embarrassment, noticing out of the corner of her eye other pedestrians looking over at them as they walked by. So much for an incognito day out away from the public eye.

"Nathaniel stand up!" Claire hissed at her son, but the little boy continued to wail as he curled into a ball over his cap. The mother bent down and took her son by the arm, "Stop the crocodile tears, I know you're not really crying. Come on!" Claire was trying to stand her son up when she thought she heard the sound of a camera shutter coming from in front of them. She looked up briefly but there were so many people ahead of them that her desperation to stop her son from making a scene overtook her intuition, and she shook away the initial concern she had that they were being photographed by the paparazzi.

"Nathaniel please!" Claire's voice had become more pleading now. The sooner he stood up the sooner they could go back to Isla Nublar where she felt safe. At least there she was able to mostly control their surroundings. As she stared at her son, who was almost wailing louder with every minute that went by, she sighed. There was only one option left, "Fine, I'll call Daddy then. Tell him you're being naughty and that you're not being good enough to go to this afternoon's training." Claire said, letting go of the little boy's arm and reaching into her dress pocket to pull out her cell. To her relief her words were enough to get her son to stop his fake-crying, "Nooooo!" he whined as he grabbed his cap and stood up. Claire still wasn't satisfied she had his complete compliance and she held her cell to her ear. Her son whined again, trying to reach up to the phone to take it from her but he was far too short. "Well put your cap back on properly and start behaving" she threatened and her son immediately stuffed his cap on his head and looked up at her pleadingly. That was enough for Claire, and the woman bent down to her son's level, straightening his cap a little, "Sweetheart, you need to be good for Mommy, okay?" Nathaniel nodded slowly, his face looking so sad and Claire planted a big kiss on his cheek, "Come on, let's go home" and she stood up again, taking her son's hand before leading him down the street towards the docks.

"I can tell by the look on your face that these magazines speak some truth so…shall I come in for a coffee and you can talk about it with me?" Betty said somewhat enthusiastically though she was clearly trying to sound sympathetic. Claire looked up from the magazines in horror. There was no way she was letting this woman into her house. She clearly wanted to find out as much gossip as possible. It wouldn't surprise her if she called the magazine companies herself to dish the dirt. Claire forced a polite face, though her heart was hammering away. She was desperate to get inside and immediately look on Google to see what had happened. What on Earth did it say? "Well thank you Betty but that won't be necessary." It actually gave her satisfaction to see the woman's face drop in disappointment. "You see, there is nothing happening here. Owen and I are still happily together. Nathaniel is happy…" Claire heard her son bounce to join her at the front door with a big grin on his face as he held her iPhone out to her, "Mommy! It's Daddy on the phone!"

Claire rejoiced inwardly at the perfect timing that was Owen calling her, and her son bringing it not only to her attention but to their neighbour's too. Betty's expression had completely dropped now as the women listened to Nathaniel talking to his father on the phone, "Yes Daddy I'm dressed… No not in my Kylo costume, my raptor clothes… I have been good, honest, ask Mommy! Ok… see you soon… love you too." Claire smiled as her son handed her the phone and she held it up to her ear, facing Betty so she heard their conversation.

"Hey babe," she started, and she let out a small giggle as her boyfriend informed her he was only calling to check their son wasn't in his favourite Star Wars costume. Claire had had quite a difficult day at the end of last week. Their son had been so stubborn, having dressed himself in the costume whilst Claire had been preparing his breakfast, and refused to change into more appropriate clothing ready for the raptor training with his father. It had taken her an hour of arguing before she had succumbed to how exhausted she felt and had broken down in tears. She'd called Owen desperate for him to tell their son that he had to change into cargos and a t-shirt as the little boy stood with his arms crossed in a strop. Her boyfriend had been a hero, immediately driven over to the house and scolded their son for upsetting his mother. He'd managed to get the stubborn three year old to apologise and change into more appropriate training clothing whilst Claire had got herself ready to go over to the paddock. "Listen is it okay if I call you back in a minute babe, it's just I've just got Betty at the door." That seemed to be enough of a hint for Betty, and the older woman's face scrunched into an apologetic expression, she held her hands up then began walking backwards away from the house with a wave. Claire held the magazines up as a way of saying goodbye and she heard Owen groan down the phone to her "Oh god, not that woman!"

Claire closed the door behind her, "She's gone now," she said, her son having resumed his position in front of the TV, and she immediately dashed upstairs, "Just the mention of you was enough to scare her off." Claire said with a giggle as she reached the top of the stairs and made her way over to the bedroom. "What did she want?" Owen asked her down the phone, but Claire wasn't paying too much attention. She had found her iPad. "She was just wondering if we were okay…"

"Hmm…that's nice of her?" Owen didn't sound so sure. Claire rummaged down the back of the bed frame and found her glasses case that Nathaniel had knocked down there first thing that morning. She pulled her glasses out of the case and placed them on her face while she opened Google on her iPad. "Oh don't you worry, I'll tell you all about it when I see you in a bit." Today was Friday. She was due to take Nathaniel over to Raptor Ranch ready for the first full run-through of the Raptor performance. They had only next week to perfect it until the attraction opened to the general public the following Monday. And from the looks of the results that were coming up from a Google News search of 'Clawen' it was likely she would need to make an appearance on the bridge too, because as far as the general public were aware, she and Owen had recently endured a very messy breakup.


	37. Celebrity Status & A Source of Stress

Owen could feel his left hip going numb as he lay beside the little bed on the laminate flooring of Nathaniel's bedroom. The only light in the room came from the dinosaur night-light that Owen had stuffed under his right arm so it would light up the paperback book he had in his hands as he read it softly, "The wild things roared their terrible roars, and gnashed their terrible teeth, and rolled their terrible eyes, and showed their terrible claws, but Max stepped into his private boat and waved good-bye, and sailed back over a year, and in and out of weeks and through a day and into the night of his very own room where he found his supper waiting for him…and it was still hot." Owen read the final line of the book and paused letting out an inaudible yawn. He couldn't count how many times he had read it before but Where the Wild Things Are was his three year old son's favourite book, just as it had been his when he'd been a child. Owen looked down to his left and smiled. Nathaniel was finally fast asleep, curled up, squeezing his favourite cuddly toy in his arms. The little boy had had quite an eventful day. In fact, they all had.

Owen brought his hand up to his face and pulled his sunglasses off the bridge of his nose, sliding them down the front of his t-shirt so they hung from the neck of the fabric. He felt Claire squeeze his hand nervously and he looked down to his right at her. She had chosen to wear her favourite dark blue dress and had her hair tied back in a loose bun. He could barely take his eyes off her as she pushed her sunglasses from her face up onto the top of her head. She looked stunning. He could understand her nervous demeanour, as the couple entered the front doors of the busy ice-cream parlour. The most popular on the island and Nathaniel's favourite. Speaking of Nathaniel, Owen glanced to his left, at his son who he carried on his left hip. The little boy's eyes were wide in wonder and excitement as he stared at the massive menu above the long counter, his senses heightening with each second that passed. Owen realised that not only was this the first time they had been into this very ice-cream parlour all together it was the first time they'd been into the main heart of the park on a Saturday all together. Claire had started going here every Friday lunchtime back when Nathaniel had only been a year old and was looked after by Cassie. Since having to tell Cassie that they no longer required her services, Claire had still intended on taking her son down to the parlour as a way of clinging to some form of normality that they had always known. But over the past couple of weeks it had been impossible to maintain the tradition. Now they stood inside, by the doors, looking around in awe at the amount of people in the building. The Park was always busy but it was at its busiest on a Saturday.

In front of them was a massive queue at the counter for ice-cream, and the parlour itself was heaving. Owen had this sinking feeling they wouldn't get a seat like they had first hoped. And as though his mind had been read, an overly-smiley young woman bound up to them. She wore a bright blue apron, and a name badge that read 'Bethany'. "Ms Dearing!" the young woman exclaimed in shock at the presence of the park manager, looking from Claire, then to Owen and Nathaniel somewhat confused, "What brings you here on a Saturday?" Owen chuckled to himself at how nervous the woman before them seemed. They weren't that intimidating, surely!

"We're looking for a table for the three of us, if you have one?" Owen noticed his girlfriend look around hopefully as she asked politely, though her tone of voice was far more authoritative than it normally was when they were together as a family and Owen knew that was so she could try to maintain an air of professionalism even on her day off. The moment Claire had shown Owen the magazines that featured their 'breakup' on the front cover the couple immediately decided that the best way to extinguish any rumours would be to take part in a very public family outing, over-selling their affection so that the press and public really had no reason to presume they were having problems.

Remembering this Owen let go of Claire's hand and snaked his right arm around her shoulder while the employee who stood before them looked around the parlour nervously. The place really was packed, but luckily there appeared to be a table leaving at the back. 'Bethany' asked them to wait a moment while she readied it for them, and the little family stood patiently together. Owen felt certain he could feel Claire trembling and he pulled her closer to him for support. He was nervous too. Nervous about what people would think of them together. Nervous about how people may react. Would the people around them start asking lots of questions? Would they take photos? So long as they were together they could get through anything. They'd been through worse than this, though it had been a long time ago. Claire looked up at him with a smile and he looked into her green eyes, the same eyes their son had inherited from her. "What are you thinking?" she asked him, and Owen felt his smile broaden as he leant towards her, saying in a low voice "Just how much I love you". It seemed to be enough to get his girlfriend to let out a small giggle, muttering about how soppy he was, before she stepped up on her tip-toes and kissed him briefly on the lips. It was brief because no sooner had their lips touched their son let out a large gasp that forced his parents to part their faces in curiosity. "Balloons!" the three year old exclaimed excitably, as though the building they were in couldn't get any more exciting. Nathaniel turned to his parents, looking specifically at Claire who was smiling, "Mommy can I have a balloon?"

Owen's heart warmed as he watched his girlfriend, who he still had his arm around, bring her right hand up and across his chest, over to their son's cheek and cup it affectionately, "After we've had some ice-cream sweetheart" which was enough for the little boy to grin and look back over at the balloons by the counter longingly.

Ten minutes later and the little family were sat at a small table towards the back of the parlour having just ordered their respective ice-cream sundaes. Owen sat opposite Claire and Nathaniel, smiling as he watched his girlfriend delicately instruct their son on how to tuck a napkin into the top of his t-shirt so he didn't get any ice-cream down it. The couple let out a giggle as their son pulled a funny face having mastered the napkin-tuck. Out of the corner of his eye Owen could see two figures slowly approaching the table, but he didn't immediately turn. It wasn't until he heard a young girl clear her throat beside them that he decided to see who it was.

There, at the end of the table beside himself and Claire, stood two girls. Both in what Owen could only presume was their early teens, both wearing braces across their teeth that they showed off as they smiled. They were dressed in Jurassic World T-Shirts and denim shorts, and in their nail-varnished fingers they each held what looked like the Park brochures that came as part of the ticket-price of the park, and a Sharpie. Owen felt nervous. What did they want? Fortunately his girlfriend seemed a little less shocked, said hello and asked if they were okay. And for some reason this made the girls squeal a little. They looked at each other, then back at Claire, then Owen, then Claire again, then down to Nate, then up to Claire, "Are you Claire Dearing?" one of them asked nervously, and Owen looked over at Claire. She revealed a small curious smile as she confirmed that she was. This confirmation seemed to have been what the girls were hoping for and they squealed again, "Oh we knew it was you we just knew it! And this is Owen? And Nate?" Owen was beginning to feel a little uncomfortable as he looked from the excitable teens over to his girlfriend who now seemed just as uncomfortable at the invasion of privacy. It was unnerving to know that two strangers knew who they and their son were but they had never met. The two girls didn't wait for an answer and they began gushing information very quickly, "We're such big fans of yours Claire, we have been for years. We always knew it wasn't your fault, that disaster in 2015, we knew it. Even though Suzi in my class said only the other day that she was so sure it was your fault but I stuck up for you. I said there's no way it was your fault!" said one, "She did. I saw it myself!" agreed the other. Owen blinked slightly, trying to process what was being said, and he watched as Claire's cheeks began to flush with embarrassment. The girls continued, "We read your interview in the magazine. It was so good. You're so cool!" said one, "And such an inspiration," chimed the other, "when I'm older I want to be the boss of a big park just like you! Do you have any advice on how I can do that? On how I can be as successful as you?"

Owen watched Claire look over at him with an embarrassed smile on her face, before she looked back at the teens who were beaming at her expectantly as though all their Christmases had come at once. Claire spoke kindly, and slowly, as though she was aware that everything she was saying was very important, "Well girls, being successful comes with a lot of hard work and a lot of sacrifice." The two girls nodded in agreement, lapping up everything the red-head said. Claire opened her mouth to continue but she was cut-off by one of the teens, "Sacrifice like not having a boyfriend until Owen?" Owen saw Claire close her mouth, taken aback a bit by the teen's odd comment, "Well…I…" but the other teen jumped straight back into the conversation, "You're just our favourites! That's the main reason why we made our parents bring us to Jurassic World, to hopefully see you and Owen and Nate in the Raptor Ranch performance, but…you cancelled the performance yesterday…" Owen felt a bit guilty as the girl stopped, her face dropping slightly. They weren't starting the Raptor performances for another week, until the performance had been perfected, and it almost had. The other teen chimed in "We were so upset when we read that you two had broken up and that was the reason why the performances had been cancelled. We felt so bad for you both. And for poor Nate too." Owen looked over at Nathaniel who was happily tearing pieces off his paper napkin unaware of the two girls that referred to him. Claire hadn't seemed to notice, looking apologetically at the two teens who looked like they were about to cry. Rather out of character, the red head brought a hand up and placed it on the arm of one of the girls. This action made the girl freeze, looking down at Claire's hand in shock. Claire spoke kindly again, and Owen had to admire how open she appeared to the two girls who had clearly been rather upset by what they presumed was a difficult time for the couple, "Well you have nothing to worry about. What the press say about us isn't always true."

"So…you haven't broken up?" The girl asked hopefully, and Claire shook her head slightly with a smile. The teenagers' faces opened into huge smiles as they squealed excitably. It was such an odd sound that even Nathaniel was now staring at them in surprise as they spoke, "Yay, you guys make such a great couple!", "And Nate is so cute!" Well Owen couldn't deny that. His son was staring up at the girls with his big green eyes and they smiled at him. The three year old became shy and pulled his napkin off as he clambered up off his seat and straight onto his mother's lap. Claire let out a small giggle, pushing her chair back slightly to give Nathaniel more room before rocking the little boy from side to side reassuringly, "Sweetheart it's okay. You don't need to be shy." But the three year old hid his face in his mother's neck, twiddling a rogue lock of hair in his fingers that had escaped from the bun at the back of her head.

"Would you…sign our brochures for us…please?" One of the girls asked Claire suddenly, holding the Sharpie and brochure out to the red-head. Owen could tell by the look on his girlfriend's face that she was surprised by the question. Were they really asking for her autograph? Claire simply shrugged before agreeing then cautiously taking the pen and small booklet from the girl's hand. "What's your name?" Claire asked as she autographed the surface of the brochure, almost struggling to reach it due to her son who still sat curled up on her lap but was now watching his mother's writing curiously. "Abby" the girl replied enthusiastically, and her eyes grew in excitement as she saw Claire write 'To Abby' at the top of the brochure, just above her autograph. The other girl, 'Phoebe', asked for the same and Claire obliged. Owen was surprised that his girlfriend was relatively open to signing something for two strangers, and more-so that she seemed to have come up with an 'autograph' so quickly. He looked at the two girls who were now looking at him expectantly. Before he knew it he was also signing his name beside Claire's. It was the oddest moment he had ever had to experience in his whole life. He was a nobody. He and Claire. They were nobody's. Just a couple that happened to live and work at Jurassic World and had done a magazine interview. That was it. For some reason though, these two girls seemed to think the world of them.

"Can we have a photo with you too?" One of the girls asked eagerly and Claire looked at Owen nervously. They had agreed that if they saw anybody taking photos of themselves or their son and that person was within hearing distance they would tell them off. But they hadn't decided what to do if someone actually asked for their photo. Owen shrugged. He didn't have a problem with it. The girls seemed nice enough, and Claire seemed to like them. What harm would one photo do? He looked at his son who, while still being curled up on his mother's lap, was no longer hiding his face in her neck and was sitting normally, facing the girls. He noticed Claire follow his gaze before looking back up at the teens. "Sure. But we're not letting people take photos of Nate if that's okay?" the red-head said. It wasn't a question, it was more of a rule. The girls didn't seem to mind and immediately squealed, looking over their shoulder and motioning to a woman who was watching them from across the room.

Before long the woman, Phoebe's mother, had taken the photo of the teens with Claire & Owen, then a photo of each girl with Claire, had gushed about how grateful she was to the couple for being so kind to the girls, and even spoke about what an inspiration Claire was to working mothers everywhere. Soon the strangers had disappeared and the little family were given the opportunity to return to their seats and begin eating their ice cream sundaes that had just arrived. Owen watched Claire as she grabbed a napkin and wiped some ice cream from their son's chin as he continued to demolish a rather large portion of ice cream himself. "You've done that before, haven't you?" Owen asked suspiciously, a curious grin on his face, and he watched his girlfriend blush with a smile. She didn't say anything, instead raising her eyebrows with a small sigh, and nibbling the corner of a wafer. Owen saw her look up at him, rolling her eyes with a defeated tone, "Alright maybe a couple of times" he laughed, "What? Owen they just…come up to me…they're always so complimentary that before I know it I've signed a brochure or magazine, had a photo with them, and then they leave." Owen continued to laugh. So that's how they were getting their 'celebrity status' as Karen had begun to call it.

Celebrity status was about right. Somehow word had spread of Owen, Claire & Nathaniel's whereabouts, to the point that by the time the family had finished their ice-cream sundaes they had been interrupted four further times by different people wanting their autographs or photos with the couple or both autographs and photos. When 'Bethany' came over to clear their table Owen asked her if there was any way of leaving through the back door of the building to escape the new additions to the building which appeared to be a tour-group, some with cameras around their necks, some with Vogue Magazines in their hands, all frantically looking around the parlour eagerly. Within minutes the couple had dashed out of the back exit of the building with their three-year old son, as the tour-group had spotted them and begun taking photos from their position by the front door, yelling out to them and waving. Owen dragged Claire by the hand as they sprinted along the 'delivery-unloading zone' out the back of the stretch of restaurants that the ice-cream parlour lay on. He could hear Claire on her cell, breathlessly calling for a car to help get them away from The Hub and back home as soon as possible. Nathaniel was clinging to his father's body, sat on his left hip, complaining that he never got a balloon. But Owen didn't care about that right now. He just wanted to get them away from here and back to the house where he knew they'd be safe.

Owen closed the book quietly, and gently placed the night-light on the floor to his right. He stared down at his son for another moment, a soft smile on his face. For all the tiring days with the little tyke running around, for all the mentally draining days working at the paddock with or without him there, and for all the sleepless nights he refused to reveal to Claire that he had because he worried that the Raptor performances weren't going to go well in a weeks' time – it was all worth it. Just to see his little boy smiling and laughing during the day, and this rare moment where the three year old was sleeping peacefully at night. He looked over to his right and saw his girlfriend leaning against the door-frame of the bedroom with a content smile on her face. Seeing her smile was always an added bonus. If she was happy then he was happy. But he knew her well enough to know that the smile she wore wasn't that of complete happiness. It was content, yes. But not complete happiness. Something was troubling her, he could tell. So he stood up, planting a kiss delicately on his son's head. He heard his girlfriend walk into the room and he stepped away from the bed as she leant over to their son and also placed a kiss on the little boy's head, affectionately whispering "Night-night".

Owen wandered out of their son's bedroom and made his way over to their bedroom, closely followed by Claire, who was dressed in a pair of her pyjama shorts and a light strap-top, with her nightgown on over her shoulders. She had taken her make-up off already and he noticed the dark shadows under her eyes. He knew it was probably a culmination of their son's sleepless nights and the stress of trying to catch up on the goings-on at work during the two days that she was in the office for. But she had this look on her face, as though thoughts were whirring around in her head, and he desperately wanted to pluck them out of her mind and help her with them. He pulled his clothes off and threw on some light pyjama bottoms before clambering into bed. The couple had recently taken to not wasting time unwinding downstairs with a beer or glass of wine once their son had fallen asleep as they knew it wouldn't be long until he was up again. Instead they normally went straight to bed and chatted, or read for a while before falling asleep. Owen actually liked that routine. He felt it cleared his head a little better that way.

He watched Claire delicately crawl into bed on her side, and just lay on her back, staring at the ceiling. He propped his head up with his right arm, staring at her, "Are you okay?" he asked her quietly. She responded rather quickly "I'm fine" with a small sigh, but he knew she wasn't. Having been in a relationship with her for almost five years he knew better than to press the matter, so instead he just continued to look at her. After a few moments she sighed, a small tear falling from her eye as she turned to face her body towards him, her left hand now propping her head up. "I guess I'm just stressed about this whole privacy thing. I mean, I can't go anywhere on this island without being recognised. And I know it's selfish of me to say that it's all about me being recognised because it's not, you're getting recognised too, I know." Owen didn't have the heart to tell her that he rarely got recognised and that today really had been the first time he had ever been spotted so to speak. Nor did he have the guts to tell her that it was probably due to her hair that she was so easy to spot in a crowd of visitors.

"Cameras are everywhere. People are everywhere…" Claire was beginning to flay her right hand about a bit the more she got stressed."Can't you control that in some way? I mean, you are the Chief Park Manager" he tried to suggest helpfully but it in no way calmed the red-head who looked almost as stressed as she had done before he spoke, "How would I even go about that Owen? I can't make a new policy that visitors are not allowed cameras or technology into The Park, because as helpful as that would be to our privacy it wouldn't help the promotion of The Park. There's no way I could control it!" Owen hushed softly and reached out with his left hand to take her right hand that had been flaying about as she had stressfully spoken. He had half expected her to snatch her hand back defensively but she didn't and instead saw her let out a big sigh before leaning into him. He felt her curl her left arm up under her body, her right palm resting against his chest and he pulled her into a tight hug, her head under his chin. He had had no idea this was what the source of her stress had been about recently. "I just want our son to have as normal a childhood as possible. I just have no idea how that's going to happen while we're on this island" he heard her confess quietly. This was the first time he had heard her mention something negative about living on the island. As though she was now beginning to consider wanting to move. "We'll figure something out. We always do" he said reassuringly. They would, he knew they would.

Owen brought his left hand up and began glazing it across her back, his fingertips tracing over that deep scar she still had diagonally across the skin, a forever reminder of the terror they went through five years ago. He looked down as his hand moved across to her right shoulder, his fingertips tracing over the skin that boasted thousands of tiny orange freckles and he noticed the skin on her arm go goosy. Owen then brought his hand up to her head, tucking her long red hair behind her right ear, and as he did so he kissed the top of her head affectionately. He heard Claire sigh into his chest then he saw her bring her head up to look at him. She brought her left hand up, sandwiching it between the pillow and his right cheek which she delicately cupped, glazing her thumb across his stubble as she looked into his eyes. Owen could've stayed in this moment forever, laying with her as he stared into her green eyes. The longer they stayed in that position, the more he realised that he no longer needed to be on this island to be happy. He didn't need to have a job, or money. He just needed her. He didn't even need a house. Claire and Nate was his home. No matter where they were in the world, so long as they were together he would be home.

Owen felt his stomach lurch as he realised how perfect this moment felt. He wanted to do it. He wanted to ask her to marry him. He wanted to get her to stand up so that he could get down on one knee, tell her everything he loved about her and more, then ask her to marry him. They could get married here on the island. Or not. It was up to her. It was her big day. And from the sounds of things her love for the island was slowly depleting. So chances were they'd get married back in New York. Or California where his parents were at. And Nate could be his best man, dressed in matching suits.

Owen opened his eyes, having not realised he'd closed them, and he saw that Claire had drifted off to sleep. She looked beautiful. Her face covered in freckles after another long afternoon in the sun, this time down by the cove doodling in a small sketchbook while Owen and Nate fished. He loved to watch her sleep. She looked peaceful and relaxed when she slept. And he always had to pinch himself as he struggled to believe that this beauty was his other half. The mother of his child. And she would soon be his fiancée. When the time was right.


	38. The Small Dock & The Notepad

Claire sat at the end of the small dock, her feet swishing about in the relatively murky lukewarm water of the lake that stood before her. She brought a hand up to push back her long red hair that had escaped from behind her ear thanks to the delicate warm early evening breeze. It was nice to have the opportunity to sit and feel at one with the environment around her without the sound of her son careering around her or chatting away in the background. She loved the three year old with all of her being, but sometimes she needed a rest, and this evening was that. The chance to stop and recharge her batteries both physically and emotionally. Today was Sunday, the day the little family usually visited the peaceful hideaway that was Owen's bungalow, but this evening the couple were here alone. Claire looked over her shoulder with a smile as she watched her boyfriend peering over the home-made BBQ he'd built just before the small dock, inspecting the coals he had lit not so long ago. Today was their five year anniversary. They had been together for five years. Through the ups and downs. Claire couldn't believe it. He had won her over five years ago. Now he was no longer the cocky, rude, big-headed Raptor Trainer she had once disliked, but instead the charming, handsome, confident Chief Raptor Trainer that she loved!

The couple had decided to make their anniversary date not the first time they had kissed (it seemed distasteful given that it had been the fateful day that the Indominous Rex had escaped) nor the first time they had slept together. In fact the date they had decided on was actually ten days later, the first time they had returned to Owen's bungalow when they had returned to the island, when Owen had asked her to be his girlfriend. Claire turned back and resumed her focus on the sun's rays that danced on the surface of the lake in front of her and she smiled. It was hard to believe that five years ago she had been sat in this very spot with her feet dipped in this very water. Her hair had been much shorter back then. Her body still weak and fatigued. Her cuts and bruises still relatively fresh and raw. The Park hadn't reopened. And Nathaniel was a mere twinkle in her eye.

Claire was frozen to the spot, her hands gripping the edge of the small wooden dock, with cuts and bruises still visible on her fingers and knuckles from the busy day they had had yesterday, clearing as many of the offices in the hub of the park as possible while some of the other team members, led by Owen, went out to assess the amount of dinosaurs they thought had escaped. She had just placed her feet in the lake water and even though it was a little cooler than she had expected it didn't appear to be salt water like she had first feared. Her feet were still battered from their escape from the island last week but the skin around her heels and toes were beginning to heal. The cool- ish water was soothing. Claire took a deep breath of fresh air and a calm smile grew on her face. The sun was only just beginning to rise behind her, but she couldn't see it yet for the trees. So she chose to look out onto the beautiful scenery before her. It was crazy to think that she now sat on the end of the small dock at Owen Grady's bungalow. This place that she had only visited once before now. A week ago. When she had come to pick him up to take him to the I-Rex paddock. An hour later and the man would be running for his life, and she would be hearing it all down her cell phone as she drove.

The blood drained from Claire's face as she heard blood-curdling screams rush into her ears and her heart began to race as she quickly brought her hands up and slammed her palms against her ears. But they did not block the sound. The beautiful scenery still remained all around her, but Claire did not pay any attention to it, as the memories of last week drew her away from all that was peaceful in this world. Her breathing increased and she clenched her eyes shut, hoping beyond all hope that the sounds would disappear, but instead the back of her eyelids replayed memories of scattered dead bodies and blood. So much blood.

Claire felt a pair of arms take hold of her and she let out a scream. The noises stopped, and all she now heard was the sound of a low soothing voice, hushing her gently as the pair of arms wrapped themselves around her. Claire opened her eyes to see a shoulder, she could feel somebody's chest against her right ear as her left hand now gripped the material of a shirt. She let out a shuddering sigh as she heard Owen telling her that everything was okay.

Claire slowly pulled out of his grip and sat up slightly, wiping away tears on her cheeks that she hadn't realised had escaped. She was embarrassed. She wasn't the one who needed protecting. She was the strong one. She was the boss. She was in charge of everything that happened on this island now. She hadn't cried when they had first arrived at that hotel room last week, he had. He needed her. Not the other way around. Claire realised that, while her feet mostly remained in the water, she now had her body leant against Owen's, her fingers fiddling with the fabric of his clean shirt as he affectionately stroked her hair. "Did I wake you?" she found herself asking, her focus remaining on her fingers, but she saw Owen shake his head out of the corner of her eye. Claire turned back to look at him and saw the same expression she always saw whenever he came to tug her out of one of her 'moments' as she had begun to call them. Owen's face looked sad as he looked out at the lake in front of them, the early morning light highlighting the stubble around his jawline, "I was already awake" he said with a small sigh. Claire knew what that meant. He had been woken by a nightmare. Another nightmare. They had only begun a couple of days ago, when a video of the Indominous Rex's rampage had been shown on one of the news channels in their hotel room. The roar of the dinosaur had seemed to snap something in Owen's mind so that, by the time he was asleep, all of the horrors of that tragic day came flooding back. Claire couldn't count the number of times that she had been woken by his cries already, and she had taken the responsibility each time to shake him awake then pull him into a tight hug. Owen normally calmed as soon as he saw her, as soon as he realised she was okay and that whatever he had seen had been a nightmare. It did mean, however, that he was reluctant to fall asleep, for fear of being sucked back into his deepest darkest nightmares again. He never spoke about what his nightmares were about.

Claire maintained her focus on Owen, having dropped the fabric of his shirt, and realised that this was the first time, in the two and a half years-or-so that she had lived here, that she was spending the early hours of daylight with someone. Not only that, she was spending it with her boyfriend. Boyfriend ! Last night he had actually asked her to be his girlfriend and she had said yes. Of course she wanted to be his girlfriend. She looked away from him, her cheeks flushing red with embarrassment as he turned and caught her staring at him. "What?" she heard him ask her curiously, and she shook her head slightly, a small smile still on her face as she smoothed a finger delicately over a particularly deep cut on her knuckle, "Nothing I just…" she paused. What was she going to say? She couldn't exactly tell him that he was handsome, or that she loved him, or that she was glad he picked her from the undoubtedly large range of women he could've chosen. All of those things were enough to inflate his ego and that wasn't what she wanted. She didn't want that Owen. The old Owen. She wanted this Owen. The Owen she had got to know over the past several days. The real Owen. "I guess I just feel lucky that we've got each other." There, that was easy. It described what she felt and presumed he felt too. She could tell that he did because by the time she had looked back over at him he was now looking at her with a soft smile on his face, as though he were looking at some sort of angel. It made her feel uncomfortable. No man had ever looked at her like that before so she had no idea how to react. Her breath hung in her lungs as she watched the man slowly lean towards her, and her heart-rate began to increase as she closed her eyes and felt his lips delicately press against hers. Claire brought her hands to his chest, running her fingers over the fabric of his shirt, as she felt his strong arms wrap around her again. All of a sudden the couple froze, a rumble in the far distance sounding out. Except this rumble didn't sound much like the rumble of thunder, but more the rumble of a loud roar. Claire wrenched her eyes open, not realising that she had gripped Owen's shirt so tightly, nor had she realised that he was holding her tighter too. The two pulled their faces from each other and stared into each other's eyes, a sudden realisation of where they were. They were not on a peaceful desolate island. They were on what was deemed to be one of the most dangerous islands in the world at the present time. And here they were, just casually sat outside, on the edge of a small dock, no protection, no back-up. Just each other. Any of the escaped dinosaurs that were still out there could easily stumble across the bungalow and attack them. And it was this thought that made the blood drain from both of the human's faces.

"We should get to The Hub" Claire heard Owen say and she nodded, releasing her grip on his shirt as he stood up. She winced slightly as she stood up herself, the pain of her feet at its worst first thing in the morning, and she allowed him to help her stand up. Claire brought her right hand up to block the early morning sun from getting into her eyes. Her feet ached, and her head felt heavy with thoughts and fears. Then all of a sudden she felt Owen take her left hand. It wasn't something that was unusual for him to do any more, and she no longer felt uncomfortable about it. If anything he seemed to do it automatically and if he didn't initiate holding her hand then she would initiate it instead, automatically reaching over to him as they walked so that he would take her hand. It was the smallest of things, but any time he did it Claire felt her heavy thoughts and fears slip away. It was as though by taking her hand he was saying to her 'I know that you don't feel right, I know that you're afraid, but I'll be here with you while you figure it out', and it was this knowledge that helped keep Claire calm. So long as they were together they could tackle anything that came their way. The good and the bad.

Claire skipped up the wooden steps and into the bungalow. She had ensured over the years that while it maintained relatively tidy, it would always be Owen's bungalow. Not hers. Not theirs. But his. This was like his retreat, or at least an option for her boyfriend if he ever felt he needed to retreat. They would bring their son here every Sunday afternoon, but that was as much as the little boy saw of his father's property. The parents didn't want to confuse their son into thinking that he had more than one home, because he didn't, they just had the one place they called home and that was their house. This…was more like a holiday home.

Owen was in the kitchen gathering the food to put on the BBQ, and he called out to her while his head was in the fridge, "Fancy a glass of wine?" Claire walked through the kitchen and towards the bedroom at the back of the bungalow, "I thought you'd never ask." She heard her boyfriend chuckle from the kitchen as he closed the fridge door. She stepped into the bedroom. It was a bit of a man-cave in that there were a lot of manly books on survival and the wilderness on the bookshelves, boyish blue bedding on the covers and pillows, and a big poster of a motorcycle on one of the small walls that Claire had to bite her tongue over each time she saw it. This wasn't her place, it was Owen's. She began looking between the books on the bookshelf, "Hey, you haven't seen my notepad have you?" she called out to him. Well it wasn't on the bookshelf. Claire glanced around the room and her eyes lay on the bedside table. She thought she'd used it on Sunday to write a list of what they needed to have sorted before they went away to Karen's wedding, she just couldn't remember which room she'd been writing it in. Either way she had definitely been in this bungalow because it had been raining so badly on Sunday.

Claire walked over to the bedside table and reached out to open the draw. She furrowed her brow as she heard Owen yell "No!" from outside the bedroom door before lunging into the room and slamming the draw closed, "the…draw is broken…" Claire looked up and her boyfriend seemed to be perspiring a bit. It wasn't that humid this evening. It seemed as though he couldn't look her in the eye and so Claire squinted slightly. What was wrong with him? "But my notepa-"

"-is in the lounge. Where you left it on Sunday" her boyfriend quickly reminded her. Claire remembered now, she had been writing the list in the lounge, whilst Owen had been preparing lunch, and she had been pestered by Nathaniel to get her to let him draw on the notepad too. She had eventually caved, leaving him to squiggle on the notepad on the floor while she went to sit in the porch area just outside the door, to watch and listen to the heavy rain that had begun falling. Claire stepped away from the draw and walked out of the room, confused as to her boyfriend's unusual behaviour. She noticed the notepad on the floor of the corner of the lounge and picked it up, smiling as she saw pictures her son had drawn of himself and his 'little sister'. It was no longer freaking her out, this whole 'little sister' thing that Nathaniel had going on. If anything, it was now becoming rather sweet. To the point where Claire was beginning to think that step one of considering to have another baby was complete – their son seemed sold on the idea of having a sibling. The next step would be suggesting it to Owen…

"How long until dinner?" Claire asked as she reached out for the pen that lay on the small table in the lounge. "About an hour?" was the response she heard from the bedroom, and as she reached the door of the bungalow, ready to step out onto the porch, she saw her boyfriend wandering through to the kitchen. He seemed nervous and she furrowed her brow, "Everything okay?" she asked him, but he merely nodded with an "Uhuh" before taking the glass of wine that he had poured out and passed it to her. Claire took it then made her way out of the bungalow. Now wasn't the time to be broaching the subject of having another baby. Definitely not.


	39. Questions & Precautions

Owen's heart was in his mouth and he closed his eyes with a quick sigh as he heard his girlfriend walk out of the bedroom and into the lounge. She'd almost seen it. He gingerly opened the draw that he'd told her was broken. But it wasn't broken at all. He was actually surprised that she had believed him. There, sat in the back corner of the draw of the bedside table, was a small black box. Owen reached into the draw, wrapping his fingers around the small back box and pulling it out to inspect it, "How long until dinner?" he heard his girlfriend call out to him from the lounge. Owen opened the small black box and inside was a platinum engagement ring, with a diamond that was the most sparkly thing he had ever seen, "About an hour?" he replied to her, though he wasn't really listening so couldn't tell if she'd responded. He closed the small box and decided the safest place to keep it was in the pocket of his pants pocket, so that's where he put it.

Owen walked out of the bedroom in a bit of a daze, over-aware of the small black box he had in his pocket. It was the most important thing he had ever bought. He noticed his girlfriend stood at the door of the bungalow but he carried on over to the kitchen. "Everything okay?" he heard her ask, but he was too nervous to look at her, afraid that if he did she might work out what he was planning on doing, "Uhuh" he replied, picking up the glass of wine he had poured out for her, and held it out for her to take. He let out another relieved sigh as she left the bungalow and he heard her walking out to the small dock by the lake behind the bungalow. He held a hand to his pants pocket and felt that the small black box was still there. He planned to propose to her at some point this evening. Their five year anniversary. Five years had been a long enough wait. They had a home and a son together. Their home and career balance worked well. Owen really couldn't see a better time for him to propose than this evening. Waiting until next month for Claire's birthday would be a bit selfish on his behalf, to detract attention from her birthday that she never asked for, and waiting for Christmas would be a terrible idea because Claire's sister was getting married the day after Christmas Day. The last thing he wanted was to make Karen's big day one of Claire's biggest days. Karen would never forgive them. In fact, it was likely Claire wouldn't forgive him either. And despite an attempt at trying to find out what Claire's ideal proposal would be, Owen really hadn't come up with much of a plan.

"So…if I proposed to you one day, how would you want me to do it?" he wasn't in the slightest bit subtle with his question. Owen watched his girlfriend narrow her eyes slightly, a small smile growing on her face as she tried to read his mind. They both sat in the hot tub at the back of their house, a glass of wine in her hand, a bottle of beer in his. Today was Owen's birthday and they had started drinking in the hot tub a couple of hours ago once their son had fallen asleep upstairs in his bed. Owen was a whole thirty nine years old. Next year would mark his big four-zero, followed by Claire's a couple of months later, not that either of them felt it. Their son made them feel young again. Owen had to admire the way his son saw the world sometimes. Yes the three year old was clever, but he also had a beautifully honest way about him too. And it was often those particular ways that helped Owen take a step back and have a look at the full picture. Something as simple as Nathaniel insisting that instead of killing all the ants that had decided to congregate at the bottom of the pavilion steps in their back garden, that he just divert them to a different part of the garden. The little boy had been adamant that no creature should die, no matter how big or small they were. So Owen and Nathaniel had created a sort of path of sugary water that led the ants away from the house and closer to the back of the garden. Little did his son know that Owen had gone out later that afternoon and had had to kill them with bug spray to prevent the house from eventually getting infested…

"I don't even know how to answer that." Claire's response had been just what Owen had expected as she let out a small giggle, sipping some more of her wine. She wore a white bikini and had her red hair tied up into a high loose bun on top of her head. Her face was lit by the lights from the hot tub, and the two porch lights that hung from the porch roof nearby. She looked beautiful. He knew he wanted to marry her and, after reading his interview in Vogue, she knew he wanted to marry her. He had finally bought a ring with the assistance of his brother who had been in a jewellers whilst talking to him on FaceTime. A ring that his brother would be hand delivering to him in a couple of weeks' time when he and his wife, Emma, were due to visit the Park and the little family. Now all Owen needed was a hint of how Claire wanted him to propose. It had to be perfect. He wanted everything to be perfect.

"Well…how did you dream of being proposed to when you were a kid?" he asked. Surely whatever the answer to that was he would gain a tiny scrap of an idea that he could work on. Hidden in a slice of cake at a posh restaurant. On a secluded beach somewhere. On top of a mountain. At Disneyworld. Claire raised her eyebrows, "This will probably come as some surprise to you but as a kid I never dreamt of the proposal, only ever the wedding." Okay, so there wasn't even a scrap of an idea that he could work on. Dammit. If he could've trusted Claire, his highly organised girlfriend who loved to be in control of her life, to do anything it would have been the planning of the perfect proposal. Owen sat back in the hot tub, his arms over the side as he looked out into their dark back garden. He began wracking his brains for any sliver of information she may have given him about herself over the past four and three-quarter years that they had been in a relationship for, that could help him come up with an idea. The vibe he always got whenever she spoke about what she had been like in college, and she didn't speak about it a lot, was that she had been a bit of a romantic at heart. She had loved poetry, romantic novels, and movies with love that the protagonists had for each other overcoming all obstacles. Suddenly he sat up, leaning towards his girlfriend who looked very surprised at his sudden enthusiasm, "Moulin Rouge!" he yelled excitably, to which the red head in front of him grinned as she brought a finger to her lips and shushed him, before pointing above them, meaning their son was asleep in his bedroom but might wake. So Owen lowered his voice, but didn't hold back his enthusiasm, his mind flickering to the image of the DVD boxset she still insisted on keeping on one of the bookshelves in the lounge despite them no longer owning a DVD player, "Moulin Rouge! You said once that you loved that film!"

Claire's face dropped, and she raised an eyebrow, unimpressed, "Owen, I do not want you to sing a proposal at me. Besides they were doomed lovers." Owen paused. Now he'd heard it, it did seem like a bad idea. Plus he had no idea how to sing. "Romeo & Juliet…" he began as he thought about the other DVD in the boxset, but Claire held her hand up to stop him from continuing, "Also doomed lovers…" she added, but Owen shook his head and smiled, taking her hand and moving it from his face, "But no matter how doomed, both couples were lovers. They believed that no matter how difficult, volatile, or unwelcoming their environments were, so long as they had each other nothing mattered." He had no idea where those words had come from and he blamed the four bottles of beer he'd already consumed since returning home a few hours ago. But it seemed to have made Claire think for a moment. He watched her swirl her wine around in the glass thoughtfully.

A small smile grew on her face as she rolled her eyes and looked up at him, "Okay, I don't have any specific idea of how I want you to propose. Just…" Owen listened intently at her impending instructions, already rather relieved that he didn't have this huge dream to try to live up to, "Nothing too fancy. Nothing in public. Nothing that involves my family please. Or yours." She added, "And please, God, no dressing Blue up in some crazy outfit with a 'Will You Marry Me?' sign hanging out of her mouth!" Owen smiled at the thought of Blue being involved in the proposal. Could you imagine? "Claire, it's difficult enough getting her to lay down on command. You really think I could dress her up and get her to hold a 'Will You Marry Me?' sign?" he laughed, but soon stopped when Claire added, "The same goes for our son." Owen's face dropped. That had been his back-up plan. Get a nice meal on the go, dress their son up in a little tux, holding the ring box and a small banner up which said 'Will You Marry Me' and then she would find the whole thing adorable and immediately say 'yes'.

Owen watched as Claire placed her wine glass down, slowly left her side of the hot tub, and straddled his waist, placing her arms around his shoulders to steady herself as she spoke in a flirty voice, "I just want it to be you, and me. Nobody else." Owen placed his right arm around her waist as he looked at his girlfriend, excited to see that her face was only an inch from his, "Nobody else" he replied in a low voice and Claire nodded slowly with a smile. A smile that Owen reciprocated. His heart skipped a beat as he felt her kiss him lightly, teasingly on the lips. A kiss that soon turned heavy once Owen had dropped his beer bottle and wrapped his other arm around her waist, pulling her closer to him.

Owen carried a bottle of beer outside with him, along with a small tray of fish that he intended to BBQ, ready for their dinner. As he stepped down from the bungalow he couldn't help but look around him. At the trees that stood in a thick bunch across from the gravel path at the front of his property, to the trees that stood either side of his bungalow, before looking at the land along the edges of the lake. Not a soul could be seen or heard, except for Claire who had just reached the end of the little dock behind his bungalow and now sat in one of the two chairs that they had put at the end of the little dock when they had arrived a couple of hours ago. He hadn't expected anybody else to be here but them, but they couldn't see their little spot of tranquillity remaining private for many more months. The guests at Jurassic World appeared to be getting a little more adventurous, ignoring Keep Out signs that were dotted about the northern part of the island. That was how, late one afternoon, Claire had found a small group of 'Clawen Fans' on the doorstep of their house, having followed her home after a Raptor performance. As expected, his girlfriend had been rather shaken by the experience (which had thankfully been handled by Betty Wilson. The nosey neighbour who lived opposite had shooed the fans away) to the point that their home now boasted extensive locks on both the front and back doors as well as all the windows. These were installed as precautions. Claire hadn't wanted to take any chances and he could see why. The first step was finding out where they lived. The next step would be someone letting themselves into their house…

Owen looked up at the sky and grimaced. The early evening sun still shone from across the lake, but behind him a gathering of gloomy clouds were building and Owen had a sinking feeling. As though this evening may be a wash-out. He began making his way over to the BBQ, noting that Claire was scribbling something down on the notepad she'd brought onto the small dock with her. It wasn't unusual for the evenings to become overcast, especially during Fall, so for now Owen decided to remain positive. There was no way it would possibly rain. At least not before dinner.


	40. The Paparazzi & The List

Claire glanced up at the sky that was becoming increasingly gloomy with the passing minutes. She clutched the notepad in her arms and walked down the small wooden dock, looking over at the edges of the lake, almost as if expecting to see a person or people looking over at her. But, to her relief, there was nobody there. She had had a scare a couple of weeks ago when she had returned home from Raptor Ranch late one afternoon, after the final performance of the day. One of the guests who had been at Raptor Ranch followed herself and Nathaniel back to the house. Claire had got out of the car, walked her son into their home, and begun running a bath for the little boy when she had heard a knock at the door. She'd answered it and to her surprise seen a grown woman and three teenage girls all gathered together on the doorstep, all with their phones out, presumably taking photos. Claire had been so shocked she could barely talk, and so the women had all done the talking for her, with comments such as "You're so beautiful in real life!" and "Why aren't you in the show as much anymore?" and more worryingly the eldest woman who seemed to be in her late forties had kept looking into the house asking if Owen was at home. Claire had been incredibly shaken by the intrusion of privacy. It was the only time she had ever been relieved to see nosey-neighbour Betty Wilson arrive at her house, behind the 'fans' who had still been bombarding the red-head with questions. Betty had asked if everything was okay, though she could see it wasn't, then had proceeded to tell the strangers off and saw them back into their car, threatening to call park security. Claire had then invited Betty into the house as a thank you, and Betty had made them both a cup of tea while Claire stuck the TV on for Nathaniel to watch Star Wars. Needless to say their neighbour had been the last person Owen had expected to see when he had come home that night. "She was probably just annoyed that there was new people on her turf trying to get the gossip" he had half-joked to Claire once Betty had gone home, but the red-head hadn't found it funny. After all of that Claire had become rather nervous about coming home or being at home full-stop without Owen there. She had insisted he install a heavier locking system to their house and she now always made sure it was locked, whether they were in the house or not.

Claire twirled a pen around between her fingertips as she looked down at the notepad then drew a line down the centre of the page she had it opened on. On the left side of the line she wrote the word PRO and on the right side of the line she wrote the word CON. She let out a small sigh, bringing the notepad down onto her lap as she looked over her shoulder and saw that Owen had stepped out of the bungalow. He was looking at the trees on the other side of the road at the top of the property. She knew he was looking for people too and her heart dropped. There used to be a wonderful time when they had never needed to be weary of people invading their privacy. Those had been the simpler times. She looked down at the notepad, at the two columns. This is what it had come to. She and Owen had been involved in a serious situation last week, and as a result had decided that the best time to talk about leaving the island would be this evening when they were alone together. At least the bungalow was a safe place to be, even if it was their final scrap of privacy.

Claire sat on the back porch, looking up at the night sky while she rocked back and forth in one of two rocking chairs that stood on the back porch. Sat in the other was Owen, who was also rocking back and forth and staring at the night sky. Curled up in Claire's lap, resting his head on her cleavage as he slept heavily, was their son. The little family had had a successful Wednesday over at Raptor Ranch. It had been seven weeks since the attraction had opened and true to their word they had done three performances a day, three days a week. Raptor Ranch was a roaring success, with audiences from all over the world coming to see not only the wonder of a live raptor performance but also one of the hottest celebrity families of the moment. But what the general public didn't realise was that the little family had already begun plans to cut down their performances gradually over the course of twelve months. It had begun a couple of weeks ago when Owen had invited Barry to join him in the performances instead of Claire, who now stood in the wings of each performance and only showed herself at the beginning to walk her son onto the bridge and at the end to walk him off. Blue had slowly gotten more used to Barry that she would let him call out some commands and so long as Nathaniel was the one to throw down her rewards she complied. Last Saturday, Owen and Barry had trialled a whole performance with just the two of them and the Raptor, without an audience. Despite a shaky start the dinosaur had performed well, so the plan for next Monday was for Barry and Owen to do the first Monday performance together while Nathaniel and Claire stayed at home. If that performance was a success then Barry and Owen would do the remaining Monday performances, with a view to it becoming a more permanent fixture in the future.

Claire glazed her left hand affectionately over her son's head, pushing back his blonde hair as he slept. They didn't often let him fall asleep downstairs, but after dinner Claire had decided to curl up in the rocking chair and respond to a few emails on her iPad while Owen took Nathaniel up for a bath. The two Grady's had eventually come back down to join her, her son clambering up onto her lap so she could read him the storybook he had brought down with him, and Claire had smiled knowing that it wouldn't have taken much for Nathaniel to persuade Owen to let him stay up with his parents just a little longer. Owen was a bit of a pushover whenever their son gave him a pleading look with his big green eyes. Now they were sat peacefully together. Claire looked over to her right at Owen and smiled softly as she watched him take a swig of beer. It was times like this that made the busy days at work and the hectic routine at home all worthwhile. For the peaceful evenings.

All of a sudden there was a fast knock at the front door of the house that made the couple jump out of their skins even though they were all the way over on the back porch. Claire could feel the blood drain from her face as Owen turned to look at her, a perplexed expression on his face. Her heart raced as the knocking sounded again, this time louder. She watched Owen stand up from his rocking chair and, unusually for him, he stepped over to his little family and kissed them both on the forehead before making his way into the house as the knocking sounded again. Claire felt her breath catch in her lungs as she listened out for the person at the front door, and she could hear the voice of a woman talking very urgently. Claire held her son closer to her body. Suddenly Owen dashed out of the back door, looking out into their dark back garden as he paced over to her, "Come on, we need to get inside!" he said quietly. There was an urgency in his voice that made Claire feel uncomfortable, but she obeyed, sensing that now wasn't a good time to be stubborn. Letting Owen take Nathaniel from her arms, she quickly followed him inside.

To her surprise she saw Betty stood in their lounge, holding a pink iPad whilst closing the blinds in the room. The sight of the woman dressed in ghastly tight pink silk pyjamas with that leopard-print shawl around her shoulders, her purple hair in tight rollers and her face covered in a green face-pack, made the younger woman gasp slightly. "What's going on?" Claire asked quietly, her voice sounding far more nervous then she'd wanted. Owen had placed Nathaniel gently on one of the sofas and the three year old didn't wake, instead curling back up into a little ball. The father paced over to the blinds by the back window, peeping out of them momentarily with a sigh as Betty spoke, "Claire, I was just on my iPad when I saw this." And the woman held her iPad out to Claire. Claire took it nervously, worried about what she may see. Her heart jumped into her throat. She felt sick. There, on the screen, were a number of photos of her, Owen and Nathaniel from this evening. Everything from Claire reading Nathaniel a story, to Owen handing her a glass of wine, to Owen swigging his bottle of beer while their son slept on Claire's lap. Someone had been watching them. Someone was watching them. Even now they were probably snapping photos. The worst thing was, this was being updated automatically it seemed, and on a website that Claire had never heard of before, ' CelebriTease : a teaser into the lives of Celebrities'. Trust Betty to have been on a website like this. "I thought I'd better let you know" Betty started and Owen moved over to join the women in the room, "Thanks Betty. I'm glad you did" he said.

It was the first time Claire had ever heard Owen say something nice to the woman. He had been polite enough in the past to not say much at all. The adults stood in silence for a moment, the parents staring down at their sleeping son, the neighbour staring at the parents. It was a difficult thought to digest. So now it seemed that even their home was no longer a safe place to be in.

"I can go out there if you like? Give them a piece of my mind?" Betty said, looking over at the closed blinds of the lounge angrily, as though she could see through them and at the photographer. Claire felt an unusually warm feeling rush over her body momentarily. As though she felt a tiny, tiny bit better at the thought that they had someone here on the island who was willing to protect them. There weren't many people here who were. Whether it was for Betty's own personal gain was anybody's guess, but Claire liked to think that it was because their neighbour actually cared about them. "Thank you Betty," she said, handing the iPad back to her neighbour, "but I don't think going out there is a good idea. They'll give up now we're indoors." but even as she spoke Claire couldn't be sure how confident she felt that her words were true. She looked over at Owen and noticed a look in his eye that she hadn't seen in a long time. Not since that night five years ago, when Vic Hoskins had had the audacity to use Owen's raptors to help hunt down the escaped I-Rex. Owen had been furious back then, just as he seemed furious now. Not frustrated, as she'd seen him sometimes get over the years, but furious. "I think its best that you leave," Claire said nervously to their neighbour, wanting to give Owen the opportunity to vent his anger in private rather than giving Betty any more ammo to run to her favourite gossip magazines with. The older woman tried to protest but Claire already had her arm around her shoulders, guiding her to the front door, "Thank you so much again for coming round Betty. Really. You're such a good neighbour." Claire knew those words, along with physical touch as simple as her arm around her shoulder, would be enough of a thank you for Betty, who was secretly as much of a fan of the couple as any of the people who approached Claire and Owen for a photo or autograph.

As Claire closed the front door behind Betty she locked every lock that was attached to the door, then leant her forehead against the frame, closing her eyes for a moment as she let out a long sigh. Owen now had every opportunity to vent his anger of this situation if he needed to. There was nobody to interfere. She had never seen him get angry before. Normally he got frustrated and needed some time to just process the situation he or they were in. The situation they were in now, the biggest damage to their small scrap of privacy, was something they had never experienced before and as a result she had no idea how he was going to react. Claire turned to look at her boyfriend and she could see him stood with his hands on his hips, staring at the blinds of the back window, as though able to see through them. From the angle he was stood at she couldn't quite see all of his face, but she could see enough of it to know that he was angry. His chest was rising and falling relatively quickly as though adrenaline was beginning to pump around his body. "Owen?" she said quietly, wanting to break his thought process, wanting to bring him back into the room. It seemed to work, and she saw her boyfriend blink before turning his head to look at her. But his face didn't relax and Claire didn't feel any more reassured that he was going to calm down. She watched him make his way over to his boots that were under the stairs, "I'm going out there to find them" she heard him say. Her heart fell. He couldn't go out there and leave them alone in here.

"Don't-" she began but her boyfriend interrupted her as he picked up his boots, "Claire, you can protest all you want-" but Claire was quick to interrupt him herself, her voice raising slightly, her words sharp and strong, "You really think going out there will help?" Owen had picked up his boots as he faced her angrily, his voice equally raised, "I do actually!" and he sat at the bottom of the stairs to put his boots on. Claire's heart was racing now, while she breathed relatively quickly. She couldn't believe he was going to go out there!

"You really think tracking this person down will stop the paparazzi and the public from coming here? To our home?" Owen had stuffed one boot on his foot and was now proceeding to lace it up, all the while his voice remaining relatively loud and frustrated, looking over at his girlfriend as he did so. Claire listened, her arms folded, "It may have skipped your mind Claire, but once upon a time I was a trained member of the Navy! It's in my nature to want to hunt down anyone or anything that is a threat to me and my team! To protect them! You and Nate, you're my team!"

"We're your family." Claire said quietly and she noticed Owen pause. It had skipped her mind that he'd been in the Navy once upon a time. It had been a long time before she had been in a relationship with him. Her earliest memory of him was of him being a Raptor Trainer. To her, that really had been his only career. Her final words had clearly been enough for Owen to stop trying to tie up the first boot on his foot, and Claire felt tears welling up in her eyes as he looked up at her. "Claire, I can do this" he said quietly. It was a confident statement, but he'd said it far more calmly. It wasn't enough for her though, "We're your family," she said quietly again, as tears slowly rolled down her cheeks. She was upset, and angry, and confused, and afraid, "and it's because we're your family that you need to stay here, with us." Owen's angry expression had completely relaxed and he stood up with a heavy sigh. Claire took a deep shuddering breath. She hadn't realised how loud their voices had got until now, as silence fell upon the house. She watched Owen slowly walk over to her, his eyes on hers, the odd sound of one boot echoing around the lounge from the one boot he had on his feet at the moment.

Claire sniffed loudly, taking another deep breath, her expression remaining strong and determined as she saw Owen stop in front of her, "Don't go" she whispered, quiet and persistent. She noticed his shoulders relax as he sighed and she immediately knew she had won. There was no way she was letting him go out there, in the pitch black, looking for someone who, for all they knew, had ran off the second they realised that their cover had been blown. "Let's just go to bed. We'll decide what to do in the morning." To her relief she saw Owen nod slowly, and she unfolded her arms, and wrapped them around his waist. As she hugged him tightly she felt him wrap his arms around her and she sighed into his chest, the tears no longer falling down her cheeks. She supposed this was one perk to being so much shorter than him, that when he hugged her like this she felt at her safest.

But no matter how safe Claire felt when Owen was with her, she still felt numb as she watched him scoop their sleeping son up, carrying him in one arm, then reaching out to take her hand in his. She let him guide her upstairs. The couple said nothing, their minds whirring at a million miles an hour. To her relief Owen didn't even pause to consider taking Nathaniel to his bedroom, instead carrying on into their bedroom. Claire crawled into her side of the bed, not even daring to turn on the fairy lights in the bedroom for fear that anybody on the outside would be able to see their shadows. No sooner had Owen delicately placed their son in the centre of the bed Claire wrapped her arms around the little boy, terrified that if she let go something may happen to him. The sickness in the pit of her stomach still hadn't left as she recalled the photos she'd seen on the website. She felt Owen crawl into his side of the bed, but even the feel of his arms around her and their son didn't make her feel better. The secret was out. People knew where they lived.

A tear rolled down Claire's cheek as she mourned the loss of their privacy. No more peaceful sunny afternoons spent down by the cove undisturbed. No more enjoyable meals on their pavilion, or dips in their hot tub in the evenings. Not without automatically looking out for paparazzi or members of the general public. The only place they had left was the bungalow.

Owen wandered down the small dock, having placed the fish on the BBQ. He watched his girlfriend sat on one of the two seats at the end of the dock, a notepad resting on her knees that she had perched together. They'd agreed they were going to write a PRO and CON list for living on the island, then weigh up if they could realistically stand living here for much longer. He smiled slightly as he watched her twirling a pen between her fingers. It was something she did when she was daydreaming, though what she was daydreaming about he couldn't be sure. "What have you got so far?" he asked, taking a seat in the chair beside her and trying to peer at the notepad. But other than a line down the centre of the page, with the word PRO written on the left side of the line, and the word CON written on the right side of the line, there was nothing else on the page. He saw his girlfriend look up from the page with a small sigh, raising her eyebrows, "Nothing so far" she said honestly. Owen followed her gaze out onto the lake as the sun hung low in the sky on the warm fall evening. Neither of them could imagine no longer being here. No longer being able to stare out onto sunsets from across the lake. Their lake. This bungalow, this lake, it had been all that Owen had considered as home several years ago when he had first started working at the Park. Before he had fallen in love with Claire.

"So pros," he heard her say as she looked down at the notepad, pen at the ready. "This" he replied, and he could see, in the corner of his eye, Claire look up at him before looking out at the lake in front of them, and her pen landed on the page with a small thud as she let her arm go heavy, "Yeah," she said with a calm sigh. There was no denying that it would take a lot for them to find somewhere as peaceful and quiet as this place. Owen saw that she was beginning to write in the PRO column. "Cons?" he heard her ask whilst she finished what she was writing. He soon realised it was a rhetorical question, "Lack…of…privacy" he heard her say as she wrote each word in the CON column. "Schools" she continued, and Owen furrowed his brow. Nathaniel was only three, they wouldn't need to worry about a school for a good couple of years, surely. "Don't look like that." Claire said sharply, which made Owen look away from the lake and over at her, his face quickly relaxing, "I wasn't looking like anything" he said with a smile. Education had been a hot topic between the couple over the past year or so. Claire still desperately wanted Nathaniel to get the best theoretical education possible, and Owen still desperately wanted to let Nathaniel learn more practical life skills. To his relief, despite her narrowed eyes, he could see a smile growing in the corners of her mouth, "I know you don't think education is a big deal, but it's a big deal to me" she said while she wrote Schools down in the CON column. "I do think education is a big deal, just…a different kind of education" he said with a cheeky grin and he could see her grinning as she concentrated on scrawling over the S in Schools a few times, "Exactly" she replied. Neither parent was going to admit that the other was right.

"Pro – the weather" Owen said, and just as Claire began writing weather in the PRO column a low rumble sounded from behind them, making the red-head let out a giggle, "the weather" she said as she finished writing. The couple paused, looking out at the low sun again. Owen's heart dropped as he thought about the main reason he wanted them to stay on the island, "Blue" he said with a long sigh. He could see Claire turn to look at him, but he continued looking out at the lake. Blue really had been the most consistent part of his entire time here on the island. He'd been here for over nine years, and it was because of that dinosaur. His dinosaur. "Blue is a pro of staying on the island" he said sadly, looking over at his girlfriend. Claire looked sad as she nodded slowly, her lips pursed, knowing that nothing she said could possibly make the idea of leaving Blue any easier. If they decided to leave of course. Owen looked down at the notepad and was surprised to see that Claire had already written Blue down in the PRO column, and he gave her a sad, grateful smile.

Claire placed the pen down on the notepad and reached over to her boyfriend, placing her right hand over his left hand that he had rested on the arm of the chair he sat in. She could feel tears begin to well up in her eyes. Seeing him look so sad made her feel very unhappy. She knew that no other pros in the world could match how important it was staying on this island for Blue. The question was, how big were the cons that threatened to outweigh the importance of this dinosaur? Owen's dinosaur. "Do you resent me for suggesting we write this?" she asked, and she waited for Owen's response with baited breath.


	41. Kids

"Do you resent me for suggesting we write this?" Owen was surprised that Claire had even considered asking him that question. Of course he didn't resent her. He had to admit, when he had returned home a couple of weeks ago to find Betty Wilson there, and to hear what had happened with the fans out the front of their house, Owen hadn't overly understood how awful the situation surrounding their privacy was. It had been horrible to see Claire so shaken up, yes, but he hadn't thought it warranted installing such complicated locks and security throughout and around the house. Not until a few days ago anyway.

Owen looked out into the darkness of the garden and watched the stars that twinkled across the sky above the house. He let out a small content sigh, looking to his left at his girlfriend who was gently rocking back and forth in her rocking chair. Owen smiled. Curled up on Claire and sound asleep in her arms lay their son. If he could take a mental photo of that very moment and keep it forever he would. But his memory was pretty terrible when it came to sentimental quiet moments like this. He turned back to the garden, gently rocking back and forth in his chair whilst taking a swig of beer from the bottle he held in his hand.

All of a sudden there was a loud and fast knocking coming from the front door. Owen jumped out of his skin and almost dropped his beer bottle. He looked over at Claire curiously and his stomach sank as he saw just how terrified she looked. He couldn't have her being afraid, not in their own home. The knocking sounded again, this time more urgently and Owen decided to investigate. His heart raced as he stood up, but before he made his way into the house he stepped over to Claire and gave her a kiss on the forehead, followed by a kiss on Nathaniel's forehead too. He couldn't explain why he'd done it. He'd never done it before. Well, he'd never kissed his girlfriend and son before going into the house. He hoped it hadn't seemed like a goodbye kiss and that Claire had seen it as a reassuring kiss, but her facial expression just as he began making his way into the house gave him the impression that she had taken it as the former.

Owen's heart was in his mouth as he walked through the kitchen and into the open plan lounge. The knocking sounded again, far louder than it had seemed when he had been sat out at the back of the house. He reached into his back pocket, pulled out a set of door keys, and skimmed through them until he found the two that would unlock the front door. The sound of them gave whoever it was on the other side of the door the satisfaction that he was going to answer, and just as Owen was about to unlock the final lock, he peered through the small window in the door. While the sight of Betty Wilson normally made his heart sink in disappointment, this time the sight of her made his stomach twist. What did she want so urgently at this time of night?

Owen opened the front door and nearly jumped out of his skin again as he looked down at his neighbour. Betty stood on the doorstep, dressed in ghastly pink silk pyjamas that appeared to only just fit her plump figure properly. She wore the horrid leopard-print shawl around her shoulders, which she had clearly chucked on in a hurry while leaving her house, along with the sandals that looked suspiciously like her husband Mike's, which she must have slid on without thinking about. But it wasn't what she was dressed like that had shocked Owen. The woman had a dark green face-pack on her face, which clashed dreadfully with her dyed purple hair that she had tightly wrapped into rollers, and even with the face-pack on she still peered out of the red framed glasses with her piercing blue eyes, "Owen!" she hissed urgently at him, "You need to get yourself and your family inside now!"

Owen furrowed his brow, "What are you talking about?" he asked. It was one thing for Betty to be nosey and always wanting to know what they were up to, but it was another thing entirely for her to be stalking them. How did she know they were outside when they were out the back of the house, out of sight from any neighbours? But, almost as though she had read his mind, Betty thrusted her pink iPad in front of his face. Owen felt the colour drain from his face as he caught sight of a website on the screen, and on that website a photo of himself, Claire, and Nathaniel sitting on their back porch. He could tell that it was from earlier that evening because in the photo Claire was reading to Nathaniel the very storybook she had read to their son earlier.

Without another moment's hesitation, Owen dashed from the front door through the lounge and kitchen, and out onto the back porch. As he made his way over to his girlfriend and sleeping son he glanced out into the pitch black of their garden. They were likely still there, whoever they were, possibly taking photos of them at that very moment. The thought made Owen feel sick, angry, and afraid all at once. "Come on, we need to get inside!" he said to Claire quietly, not wanting anybody else to hear him. He desperately hoped that she would cooperate, and not show her more stubborn side. He didn't have time for her to insist that he tell her what was going on before she moved. To his relief though she appeared to immediately read his body language, and unwrapped her protective arms from around Nathaniel so the father could pick the three year old up. Owen felt a surge of confidence the moment he held their sleeping son in his arms, and he strode back into the house, hearing Claire follow close behind.

Returning to the lounge Owen noticed that Betty had let herself in, had closed the blinds at the front of the lounge and was beginning to close the blinds at the back. Even though she was still holding that bloody iPad, it was the first time that he had felt rather relieved by her presence. Owen heard a little gasp come from his girlfriend, who was slowly walking into the lounge. Clearly she had caught sight of Betty, "What's going on?" he heard Claire quietly ask, and Owen gently placed Nathaniel on one of the sofas. The little boy merely curled up into a little ball and continued to sleep. Normally seeing his son sleeping made Owen smile, but right now he was still in shock over the idea that someone had been watching them. He paced over to the blinds by the back window as he saw Betty move towards his girlfriend with her iPad, "Claire, I was just on my iPad when I saw this." Owen peered between the blinds. Nothing. He could see nothing in their garden. It was pitch black. A chill ran down his spine as he thought about the amount of horror movies he had seen that featured this type of situation. He heard his girlfriend gasp again and he knew she was now looking at the photos on the website that Betty had been looking at. The thing was if it hadn't been for their nosey neighbour, who had clearly searched for them online to have 'stumbled across' the website, they would have never known that someone was taking photos of them from their back garden. The little family would have stayed out there for much longer.

"I thought I'd better let you know" Betty started and Owen moved over to join the women in the room, "Thanks Betty. I'm glad you did" he said, and he meant it. It was actually the first time he had ever said something nice to the woman, and he couldn't promise he would do it again. Yes she was worth her weight in gold tonight, but that still didn't detract from the fact that she was very irritating and often sticking her nose in where it wasn't wanted. And secretly, Owen still hadn't forgiven the woman for stirring up the rumours a few months ago that he and Claire had split up.

"I can go out there if you like? Give them a piece of my mind?" Betty said, looking over at the closed blinds of the lounge angrily, as though she could see through them and at the photographer. Owen watched as a small fleeting smile etched into the corner of his girlfriend's mouth and he could tell that what their neighbour had just said was a tiny ounce of reassurance in what was a very unnerving situation they were currently in. Their home was no longer this safe haven they had built it up to be. It was no longer a secret, nor private. "Thank you Betty," Claire said, handing the iPad back to the neighbour, "but I don't think going out there is a good idea. They'll give up now we're indoors."

As nice as that sounded, Owen seriously doubted that whoever it was out there taking photos of them and their house would leave just because the couple had gone indoors. They would most likely camp-out until dawn. Owen could begin to feel his heart racing again, but instead of fear like it had been earlier, it was because he was beginning to feel angry. How dare someone take photos of them?! Of his young son and his girlfriend. Without permission. Of them in a moment which many would consider an intimate family moment. There was someone out there right now. Somewhere in their back garden. Their property. "I think its best that you leave," he heard his girlfriend say to their neighbour, and as Claire guided Betty to the back door, Owen brought his hands to his hips whilst turning to look at the blinds over the back window. If he did go out there where would he start? He would probably go out the front door and sneak around to the very back of their property, to the back of their land, and sneak up on the photographer. He could still remember his training. He knew how to walk, how to hide so he was inconspicuous. Fortunately there wasn't much of a moon out tonight. Well, fortunate for him in that he would unlikely be spotted, but also unfortunate as it would make hunting down this photographer all the more difficult. But once he got his hands on the guy he'd bring them back to the house and interrogate them. Make sure the camera got destroyed…

Owen heard his girlfriend say his name, quietly, softly, and Owen blinked as he realised he'd zoned out. He turned his head to look at her. Seeing her stood there so vulnerable and afraid was the trigger, and all of a sudden Owen had made his decision. Anyone who made Claire feel vulnerable would have to answer to him. Owen strode over to his boots that were under the stairs, "I'm going out there to find them" he said, bending down to pick up his boots as he heard his girlfriend begin to protest but he wasn't going to hear of it. He needed to protect them. He'd done a poor job of it so far. Now was his chance, "Claire, you can protest all you want-" and predictably she bit back, "You really think going out there will help?" Owen stood up straight, facing her as his blood began to boil, "I do actually!" and he sat at the bottom of the stairs to put his boots on. Why wouldn't she just let him do something manly for once? It was his job to protect them. He was the man of the house and they had an intruder. Someone who was threatening their privacy. They had to be stopped.

"You really think tracking this person down will stop the paparazzi and the public from coming here? To our home?" Claire yelled. Owen had stuffed one boot on his foot and was now proceeding to lace it up. His heart was still racing, and his hands had begun to shake so much with adrenaline that he was struggling to lace his boots up which wasn't helping his frustration, "It may have skipped your mind Claire, but once upon a time I was a trained member of the Navy! It's in my nature to want to hunt down anyone or anything that is a threat to me and my team! To protect them!" Why didn't she understand? She knew this had been his life at one point. "You and Nate, you're my team!"

"We're your family." Owen froze the moment Claire had spoken. She had said it quietly. Sadly. That was the point he was making. It was because they were his family that he had to do it. He had to protect them. He looked up at her and his heart fell, "Claire, I can do this" and even though he said it quietly, he said it confidently. He wanted her to believe in him. He noticed that tears had welled up in her eyes and one began to roll down her cheek as she spoke quietly, "We're your family, and it's because we're your family that you need to stay here, with us." Owen stood up with a heavy sigh. She was right, it was no good going out to protect his family if he wasn't with them. By staying with them he could protect them if they were put in any physical danger. Not that he imagined any of the photographers or the public were dangerous enough to attack them. Owen began walking over to his girlfriend who had been stood by the front door with her arms folded, but at a position where she could see their son who was still, miraculously, asleep on the sofa, despite his parents' loud voices. He arrived in front of Claire, tears rolling down her cheeks as she sniffed loudly before letting out a deep breath. He felt awful for having made her more upset than she had already been feeling. "Don't go" she whispered, quiet and persistent, and Owen melted. How could he go now? Her bright green eyes that had once been teary now stared up at him pleadingly, "Let's just go to bed. We'll decide what to do in the morning." Owen nodded slowly. Really all he wanted to do now was to wrap his arms around her and to his relief he saw her unfold her arms. The feel of her arms wrapped around his waist meant that any remaining anger or adrenaline left in his body seeped away, and he wrapped his own arms around her body.

A few moments later and Owen was quietly carrying Nathaniel upstairs whilst holding Claire's hand. There was no way he was happy with the idea of their son being alone in his bedroom tonight and as such, Owen walked straight to his and Claire's bedroom. He watched his girlfriend climb into her side of the bed. The bedroom was very dark, but he could sense just by her sighs and what he could see from her body language that she felt uncomfortable about the whole situation. He knew the reason why she hadn't turned the fairy lights on was the same reason why he hadn't either. They had no idea if the photographer was still out there or not. If they were then they may be able to see their shadows in the window from any lights that they had on. No, the lights were staying off tonight. Owen placed their son into the middle of the bed and when he heard no more shuffling from his girlfriend who, he presumed, was trying to get into the best position to cuddle the three year-old , the father got into his side of the bed. He snaked his arm under the pillow so Claire could snuggle into him, with their son laid out between them.

This was the first night in a long time that Owen felt the weight of being a father. He wouldn't sleep well tonight, he was sure of it. He felt a tear drop onto his arm and he knew that Claire was quietly crying. He felt like crying too. Nathaniel. Their three year old son was innocent. He was vulnerable. He deserved a life where there was no threat or risk of him being photographed unnecessarily. Owen wanted them to live in a world where he wouldn't feel concerned about letting his son go out into the back garden to play alone. He wanted to be able to go out to work and feel confident that his girlfriend and son wouldn't be harassed while he was away. Owen remembered so many times when he and Claire had spoken about how important it was to them that their son have the best childhood possible. How could that happen if they were always looking over their shoulders or too afraid for their son's safety to let him go out to play? And what about when they had another baby? The press would have a field day! Claire would be harassed even more because people would be desperate for photos of her with a baby bump. Then they would be desperate for photos of the new baby. Then desperate for photos of both children growing up. And what if they had another baby after that? It would be the same situation all over again. And while he would find that stressful, yes, it would be nothing on the stress it would put on Claire. It would be her body scrutinised by the world's press and general public, not his. Parenting one child was stressful enough, Nathaniel had already proved that, but parenting more than one? More stressful. Then add the lack of privacy. Owen sighed as he felt another tear fall onto his arm. Unless they got some serious security organised, there was no way they would be able to bring up more children whilst living on this island.

"We can't keep going on like this Claire," Owen said honestly, looking back out at the lake, "We can't spend the rest of our lives here looking over our shoulders, hoping that nobody is taking photos of us or our kids" he paused. This was the first time he had ever mentioned anything out loud about them having more than one child. He had been shocked a few months back when Nathaniel had mentioned about a little sister. Shock that had subsided the moment Claire had reassured him that she was not pregnant and that their son was just imagining that he had a little sister. And despite several weeks having passed, the three year old still saved a seat for his little sister at the dinner table, he still chatted to 'her' while he was playing with his dinosaur toys, or his Star Wars figurines.

The thing was, even though Owen and Claire had both agreed that having another baby right now would be a terrible idea because it wasn't a good time to have another baby, Owen had to admit that there was never a good time to have a baby. In fact, one of the worst times to have a baby happened to be the time when they'd had Nathaniel. They'd only been together a year when Claire had fallen pregnant. The Park was being rebuilt ready for its reopening. Owen was trying to retrain Blue. And Claire had given birth, at home, a month after The Park had reopened. But they had got through it. They'd managed to get through it together. And they now had such a good routine and so much free time, what with only having three days of performances a week, that it wouldn't be terrible planning to at least begin thinking about having another baby. After all, they weren't getting any younger. And Nathaniel was getting older.

"Babe?" Owen jumped as he realised he had zoned out, and he turned to his left to see his girlfriend staring at him with her eyebrows raised. Shit. She had asked him a question and he had no idea what it had been. "I said you've never used the word kids before." Owen gulped as he saw the shocked expression on his girlfriend's face. Her big green eyes bore into him as though she was trying to read his mind. She was right, he hadn't ever used the word kids before. Another rumble of thunder sounded and Owen realised that in the time it had taken him to reflect on the idea of growing their little family the sky had suddenly become darker, despite the sun still clinging onto the final hour of daylight before it dipped below the skyline, setting on yet another day. Shortly after the rumble, Owen felt a large droplet of rain fall onto his nose. He saw that Claire had felt a drop of rain too as she glanced up at the dark clouds that had arrived above them. Without the couple saying another word, they looked at each other, and within seconds were running down the small wooden dock together, towards the bungalow, as the heavens opened and heavy rain fell down on their little section of the island.


	42. Milk-Moustache's & A Knife In The Back

p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"Claire ran as fast as her bare feet could carry her along the small wooden dock, trying to stop herself from slipping over on the damp surface beneath. The tropical rain fell heavily down on her as she ran with the odd squeal, hand-in-hand with Owen, who dragged her along to the bungalow. As they arrived on the porch of the bungalow, that was fortunately sheltered, they stopped, breathless. Claire giggled as she pushed back her wet hair from her face, and she tried to wipe the rain from her cheeks. She could hear Owen giggle as he wiped his dripping nose on his arm, looking from her then out to the BBQ which now boasted a large amount of steam, "Well…so much for the BBQ" he said, half-disappointed, half-amused. Claire looked over her shoulder at the BBQ and groaned sympathetically with a grin. She sat on the top step of the porch, looking at her boyfriend as he sat beside her. He was as soaked as she was. But she didn't care. The humidity was still warm so they weren't likely to catch a style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"She looked down at the notepad in her hand and groaned. It was sopping wet, and the ink that had been on the page now ran into a small pool at her feet. She could still just about make the words out. The couple sat in silence for a moment and Claire tried to remember what they had been talking about. span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"Kids/span. They had begun talking about having more children. A little brother or sister for Nate. She looked to her right with an expectant smile, surprised to see that Owen was already looking at her. How long had he been looking at her for? "So…you were saying about kids?" she heard him say and a smile grew on her face, "Nospan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;", you/span were saying about kids!" and she giggled again at his "oh yeah, I was…" style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"Claire held her breath. It was odd to think that he was the one bringing the conversation up. Not that she normally did. They never spoke about it. But it was odd to think that just as she was considering bringing the conversation up with him, that he do it first. "I don't want to put any pressure on you but…I've been thinking about it and…I think we're ready to start trying for another baby." Claire had felt her heart soar with every word he spoke. So they had a few issues surrounding privacy. They would just need to up their security. The Board of Directors had been very sympathetic when Claire had told them about the invasion of her privacy and the danger it put her son and partner in. She knew they were sympathetic because it was in the best interest of their most lucrative asset, Raptor Ranch, to keep the little family happy. They had already sorted a security guard to patrol the areas around the house and since then Claire Owen had heard nothing from Betty who had promised to immediately tell them the moment she noticed that someone was taking photos of them and posting them on the internet. Yes another baby would mean more responsibility, but it wasn't as though Claire had as many professional responsibilities as she once had, as had been apparent in the conversation she had had with Melanie, her 'second in command' a few days style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"Claire walked out of the elevator and into the immaculate corridor of her office building, her heels echoing around her as she approached the door to her office, bringing her handbag down from her shoulder as she pushed the handle and walked into the room. "Morning Mel" she said brightly to her 'second in command' who was sat at one of the two desks that were in the room. Claire winced and held a hand up apologetically as she saw that her colleague was on the phone, already, at 8am. The red-head walked over to her desk, placed her handbag on the surface, and leant over to turn her computer on. She took a seat, already pleased to be taking the weight off her feet, having decided to wear new heels at work without breaking them in properly./span span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"Claire picked up a pen and twirled it between her fingers as she watched her colleague curiously. The young woman had just turned thirty-two, and the red-head only knew this because she had seen her file a couple of years ago when Melanie had been hired. The 'second in command' had this precision and an eye for detail that Claire admired, from her pristine office dresses and well-kept hair, to colour coordinated stationary, and the smart-planners she had devised that synced details from meetings and conferences at the touch of a button. The problem was Melanie sometimes seemed too…robotic. She rarely flashed any sort of /span span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"emotion, and/span span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" didn't mention anything about her personal life or family. All conversations were about The Park. For two years that was all she had spoken to Claire about. She was polite of course, opening most greetings with a "Hello" closely followed by a "How are things at home?" but then it was straight down to business regardless of how Claire had answered. It sometimes made things a little awkward, like it seemed now, as the two shared the office that had once been exclusively Claire's. She had at one time spoken to Owen about it but he had just chuckled. To her embarrassment her boyfriend had told her that when he had first met her that was exactly how she had been. Robotic. Corporate. No glimmer of who she really was as a person./span span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"As Claire's computer loaded she delved into her handbag, pulled out her cell, and checked to see if there were any messages. There was only one, from Owen, which was a photo of Nathaniel with milk on his top-lip like a moustache. Below the photo Owen had written /span'span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"He says that he looks like Daddy now /spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"haha/spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" x'. Claire let out a quiet giggle and typed back 'Why? Because he has a mucky face/spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"? ;/spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" ) X'. She smiled as she placed her phone down on her desk, peeled her suit jacket from around her shoulders, and placed it on the back of her desk chair./spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;""span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"How are things at home?" she heard Melanie say from across the room and Claire looked over to see that her colleague had finished her phone call. "Good. Great. Yeah, Owen's just sent me a photo of Nate with a mucky face." Claire said with a small giggle as she remembered it, and unsurprisingly Melanie didn't respond. The manager was only in the office two days a week now, and her second in command was in six days a week. This meant that Claire often had to spend the first hour of her working day catching up with the goings on from the weekend. And this normally came in the form of a satellite call with The Board of Directors and Melanie, who was the Assistant Park Manager. "It's school vacation time in a few weeks for Great Britain, so we're due to have a high influx of families visiting" Melanie said slowly, her brown eyes concentrating on her computer screen as she clicked her mouse. Claire looked up from her own computer screen, "So the marketing campaign worked?" she asked, and her colleague nodded with an 'mmm-hmm'./spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"The two women sat in silence for a couple of moments until Claire's phone 'pinged'. She picked it up and saw Owen's response to her text: '/span span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"Haha/span span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" exactly! See this is what happens when you have to go to work x'. Claire felt her stomach knot. As guilty as she felt having to leave her son and boyfriend at home, she enjoyed that sense of normality she got by going into work. She enjoyed being able to make decisions, and to see the good that came from her decisions. She enjoyed being a respected, high-ranking member of the team that ran The Park. The highest ranking on the island in fact. And she only had to go into work for two days a week, as agreed with The Board. 'I'm sure you'll both survive until I get home x' she texted back, then held her cell up to her face to look at the photo of her son once more. The older he got the more he looked like Owen, and she smiled as a new photo arrived on her phone from her boyfriend. This time it was a selfie of Owen with Nathaniel sat on his lap. They were both grinning big toothy grins at the camera with milk-moustaches on their top lips. Underneath the photo Owen had texted, 'We can't wait to see you Mama x'. She'd been in the office for no more than ten minutes and was already looking forward to the greeting she would get from her son when she got home this evening./span span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;""span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"I've spoken to the tour team leaders, they're willing to put on four extra tours a day over those couple of weeks at the end of October" Melanie said regarding the high influx of visitors she had mentioned earlier. Claire looked up from her cell phone to see her colleague looking over at her, her expression seemed to be rather disapproving, so the red-head put her phone down, surprised at how patronising this young woman seemed. She was the older one, she was her boss, so why did she feel like the roles were reversed?/spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;""span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"Great. Well, I'll go down to the Info /spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"Center/spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" as their audit is due." Claire said, quickly glancing at the 2020 desk calendar and noticing that it was on her checklist of things to do that day. The Info /spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"Center/spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" was one of her favourite places to visit. Most of the staff had been there since The Park had been reopened three years ago, with two or three having been there since The Park had first opened ten years ago, with the exception of a year off while The Park had been rebuilt. Claire enjoyed seeing the familiar faces, especially Julie the Info /spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"Center/spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" manager, who had been at The Park since before Claire had, and reminded her so much of her mother when she had been alive. Julie was in her early sixties but still had an air of authority that meant the Info Centre ran smoothly. She also had this warmth to her nature that made everyone who met her smile, whether they be colleague or visitor. And Julie always greeted Claire like an old friend, immediately asking her how that "rascal" of hers was doing, closely followed by "and your son" which always made Claire break into a smile, despite trying to maintain her authority. Julie was one of the few members of staff who remembered Nathaniel each time Claire saw them, having brought her son to each audit on the third Thursday of every month since she had returned to work following her maternity leave./spanspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"Claire looked up as Melanie cleared her throat whilst looking uncomfortably at her, "Claire, I was on the phone to members of The Board yesterday and…well with all the drama and unnecessary attention you and your family appear to be getting from the media and general public…they've decided it best that you didn't go down to the Info /span span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"Center/span span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" during the days that you're in the office." Claire's breath stuck in her throat. Was she being told what to do by her 'second in command'?! "In fact, they feel its best you stay out of the public eye on the south-side of The Park as much as possible." Claire could swear her heart had skipped several beats in the time it took for her to process what had just been said. So not only was she only in the office a couple of days a week, but now the specific jobs she could do in the office would be limited thanks to the restrictions that seemed to be put in place to keep her out of the public eye. How was this fair? How could she possible run The Park if she wasn't allowed to actually go into The Park properly? "Look, they'll explain things further in the meeting you have with them at 9am" Melanie finished and Claire furrowed her brow slightly, "You're not going to the meeting?" it was unusual for Melanie to not be in attendance. "No, I'll be the one going down to the Info Centre to do their audit."/span span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"Hearing her say it was like a little knife in the back. Why did she have the feeling that she was being pushed out again? After all, Melanie was more than capable to run this Park herself. She was doing a lot of it already as Claire was limited to what she could do from home or Raptor Ranch. Claire sighed and looked down at her phone, at the photo of Owen and Nathaniel. There had once been a time, when she had been Melanie's age, where work had been everything to her. Now, her world /span span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"were/span span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" these two. The job that she found most challenging and most rewarding wasn't running The Park. No, the job she found the most challenging and most rewarding was being a mother. It was exhausting, yes, but oh so worth it to see her son smiling. To see how well he was growing. Each day he learnt something new, each day she found time to watch him, in marvel and wonder, at his view of the world around him. Through her role as a mother she'd found out more about herself than she had as a Park Manager. She found out that she was, in fact, far more patient than she had ever realised, and ferociously protective of her son. She found out that she could just about function all day on only a couple of hours sleep, that she was more house-proud than she had originally thought, and that she really, truly, was a terrible cook. And the rewards of motherhood were far greater than the rewards of being the manager of the most famous and successful Theme Park in the world. The rewards of motherhood came to Claire in the form of cuddles and kisses from her son, the sound of his laughter, and the fascinating conversations she always ended up having with him. She had to admit, as much as she adored him aged three, there was a part of her that missed him as a baby. Those days when she brought him into bed with herself and Owen in the early mornings so they could all go back to sleep for a couple of hours, all curled up together. Or when she would carry him around in her arms as her little bundle of joy. She missed the feel of a baby in her arms./span span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;"Claire could feel her heart thudding against her chest as tears appeared in her eyes. She sat, perched on the edge of the wooden step of the porch, soaking wet. Owen perched beside her, also soaking wet, looking out at the thick gathering of trees that surrounded the bungalow. He took his time as he spoke, and Claire was clinging to each word that fell out of her boyfriend's mouth, "But it depends on you. We can start trying for a baby if and when you want to. I don't want you to feel that just because it's something I want, that you should want it too-" Claire dropped the notepad and leant over to her boyfriend quickly, placing her cool hand on his warm cheek, and planted a big kiss on his lips. Their faces were still wet from the heavy rain and she felt him smile into her lips, which made her smile back. The kiss was soon broken and Claire leant her forehead against Owen's, whispering "Of course I want to". The couple slowly parted, with smiles on their faces, and tears had begun to fall down Claire's cheeks though they quickly merged with the rain that had fallen onto her skin earlier. Owen brought his arm around Claire's shoulders and they cuddled up together, looking out at the peaceful environment around them, listening as the heavy rain still drenched the style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /span/p 


	43. A Baby & A Proposal

Owen wiped his dripping nose on his arm with a giggle then looked past his girlfriend, who stood equally soaked, and over at the BBQ which was now smoking heavily. The fire beneath it had been extinguished thanks to the heavy rain that was now thundering down on the island. Fortunately the porch of his small bungalow was sheltered. "Well…so much for the BBQ" he said, half-disappointed, half-amused. He watched Claire look over at the BBQ with a sympathetic groan and grin before taking a seat on the top step of the porch. He took a seat next to her, smiling as he saw his girlfriend look down at the notepad in her hand that was now sopping wet, the ink running from it so the written words were trickier to make out.

Owen couldn't take his eyes off her. There would have once been a time, many years ago when they had first met, when she would have been furious at being soaked like this. He was almost certain he had overheard her mention back then that she hated being caught in the rain. That had been that Claire. This Claire was sat beside him with a small grin on her face as she looked down at the notepad, as though she were remembering something. Her red hair was sopping wet and as a result it was beginning to show signs of curling, her duck-egg blue dress hung perfectly from her body, though slightly darker in colour now thanks to the rain. He noticed her porcelain skin shone from the rain that had soaked them, which enhanced the tiny orange freckles that gathered and trailed across hewur shoulders. He looked back up at her face, smiling as he saw the gathering of small freckles just below her eyes and on her nose. He loved every single one of them, just like he loved every single part of her. She was a strong woman, and coped marvellously with running The Park as well as being the best mother she possibly could be. And she rwueally was the best mother.

Owen smiled as he thought about each milestone their son achieved the older he got, and how they both celebrated these milestones. He was proud that the little man looked the spitting image of how he had looked as a child. It was like seeing a mini version of himself running around fearlessly. He knew the fearlessness scared Claire and she would never stop being protective of their son. Nathaniel was, after all, their most precious possession. All of their belongings could burn down in a freak fire and they could be left with nothing but each other and Owen wouldn't mind. So long as they had each other. In the past, if ever Owen had envisioned a world where they were left with nothing but each other he had simply thought of himself with his arm around Claire while she held Nathaniel in her arms. But recently he had been thinking of another addition to the vision. A baby, the spitting image of Claire, with her red hair and beautiful smile, safe in Claire's arms while Owen carried Nathaniel on his hip, with his arm still around her. And this additional vision had come about thanks to a visit from his brother and sister-in-law a few weeks ago.

Owen wiped a bead of sweat from his brow as he held the handle of the new zip-line he had just installed that ran from Nathaniel's tree house down to the pavilion in the center of the garden. He had just been down it and it had seemed to work, much to his son's delight who was now jumping up and down in anticipation, excited to try it himself. "Come on then Nate" he said and the three year old lunged for the handle, taking hold of it before clipping the safety cord onto the little belt he had to wear when using the zip-line. Nathaniel wasn't allowed up in the tree house unless one of his parents were in the garden too and Owen had added a safety cord when Nate had almost fallen out of the tree trying to glide down the zip-line.

Owen let his son jump down out of the tree house and swing down to the pavilion, the little boy landing with a small thud on a small crash pad that the father had put out. The male Grady's had learnt their lesson a few months back, having roughed up their clothes with mud and grass stains following zip-line races, much to the annoyance of Claire who had told them both off for getting so filthy just as they were due to go out for dinner with Owen's parents. Owen grinned as his son laughed loudly, looking over at him yelling "Daddy it works!"

"Boys…" Claire called from the back door, and Nathaniel bounced before dashing towards the house yelling excitably, "They're here, they're here, they're heeeeeeere!" With the handle to the zip-line now down at the pavilion, Owen had no choice but to climb down from the tree-house, and as he landed on the grass below he heard a hubble of chatter coming from inside his house, which meant that Claire must have opened the door to his brother and sister-in-law. His girlfriend and sister-in-law got on like a house on fire, both of them always laughing at the similarities in temperament between the two Grady brothers. It helped that, while James was four years older than Owen and Claire, his wife Emma was six years his junior. And a few weeks ago they had just given birth to a baby boy called Logan.

Owen stepped into the house and walked through the kitchen into the lounge. By the front door stood Claire who was busy tugging their son by the arm to give Emma more room to step further into the lounge. The blonde had a baby carrier hooked on her arm as she handed a helium balloon to Nathaniel who took it excitably. It was a Jurassic World balloon that Emma was apologising for, explaining that it was the only kind of balloon they could get once they had arrived on the island. But the three year old seemed thrilled, dashing over to Owen, yelling "Daddy look! They got me a dinosaur balloon!" and Owen grinned, opening his face out into mock surprised with an "Oh wow" before moving over to greet his sister-in-law. " Owen I think this is the smartest I've ever seen you!" she joked, as he kissed her on the cheek. It was true, Claire had 'gently advised' that he wear a shirt and relatively smart pair of pants that weren't cargos today. "Claire's still doing a good job I see" the woman said with a wicked grin and Owen let out a laugh with a nod while his girlfriend greeted his brother at the front door. Nathaniel let out a big gasp as James carried a couple of gift-bags in his hands, "Presents! Uncle James have you brought presents?" and the adults chuckled as the three year old marched over to the door staring at the bags curiously.

"Nate let your Uncle get through the door please" the child's mother said with an embarrassed grin as she apologised, pulling the little boy from the door so James could step over the threshold. Owen walked over to his big brother, giving him a tight hug, congratulating him on the birth of his son as he did so. He had been surprised when James and Emma had suggested they fly down from California, especially as they had such a small baby. Both Owen and Claire remembered what it had been like when Nathaniel had been Logan's age and they would rarely consider leaving their home with their baby for the day, let alone leave the island for a whole week. But the couple had insisted that they thought it important they visit while James still had time off work and while Logan was young enough that all he mostly did was sleep. From the sounds of things Logan was a far easier baby than Nathaniel had been.

A few minutes later and the family were all sat on the couches in the lounge, Claire having sorted everyone out with drinks. Owen sat beside her, his arm lolling over the back of the couch as he watched Emma walk over to them carrying Logan in her arms with a smile on her face, "Logan, meet your Uncle Owen and Aunt Claire" Owen heard Claire take a sharp intake of breath as Emma placed the baby in her arms and he saw his girlfriend smile softly as she stared down at their new nephew. He was so small. Owen reached out with his free hand and Logan clenched onto his little finger, the uncle and aunt both breathing out a chuckle. The peace was instantly broken by Nathaniel who attempted to clamber up onto his father's lap to get a better look at his new baby cousin, speaking loudly "Can I see Logan, Mommy?"

"Yes sweetheart just…be gentle…" the red-head instructed softly as Owen pulled their son up onto his lap. The three year old peered at his baby cousin, his big green eyes like saucers as a wide grin spread over his face. For the first time ever Nathaniel spoke in a very soft voice, almost like a whisper, "He so little". Owen couldn't believe his eyes, watching as the three year old brought a hand over to join his father's, and gently glazed a couple of fingers over the back of the baby's hand as it clenched onto Owen's little finger. It made the baby jump momentarily and Nathaniel flinched, bringing his arm back quickly. Claire let out a quiet chuckle, "It's okay sweetheart you didn't hurt him. You probably just tickled him" she said softly, looking at her son affectionately. The little boy let out a quiet "oh" then looked up at his father. Owen was already smiling and gave his son a little nod, "It's okay son" and Nathaniel brought his hand cautiously back down to the baby's hand and continued to glaze his fingertips over it. "Does he like that?" the child asked as he continued to look at his little cousin and Owen saw his girlfriend nod, her smile having not wavered once since the baby had been put in her arms, "I think he does Nate. See, he's still sleeping" and Nathaniel peered closer at the baby, saying "oh yeah" quietly as he noticed the baby still had his eyes shut. Owen couldn't believe it. He had expected their son to be very full-on with this new baby. Perhaps even jealous that Claire was holding it instead of giving the three year old her attention. But from the looks of things Nathaniel seemed as captivated by the baby as they all were.

That visit had told Owen and Claire a lot. It had told them that they hadn't forgotten everything they had learnt when Nathaniel had been a baby. That they still knew how to hold a baby. It had reminded them just how often babies needed to be changed, and that they hadn't forgotten how to change a diaper. They had also learnt that Nathaniel really was good with babies. The three year old had been quiet when he remembered that Logan was near him, and had even enjoyed helping his Auntie Emma, or Uncle James, or mother, or father when it came to changing Logan's diapers or giving Logan a bath. So it seemed that not only did Owen believe that he and Claire were ready to have another baby but that Nathaniel really did seem ready to be a big brother.

Owen was aware that he was still smiling when Claire turned to look at him, clearly surprised that he was already looking at her, "So…you were saying about kids?" he said, and his heart soared as she giggled, a smile growing on her face, "No, you were saying about kids!" He felt a little nervous. He didn't want to pressure her into making any decisions, particularly as it was her body. She would be the one having to carry their baby for nine months whilst looking after Nathaniel alone for three days a week, and their son was very exhausting at the best of times. "I don't want to put any pressure on you but…I've been thinking about it and…I think we're ready to start trying for another baby." Owen held his breath. He hoped she was okay with what he had said and what he was suggesting. A smile remained on her face, but she looked as though she had frozen for a moment, trying to process what he had said. The pause was long enough for his heart to drop and he looked out at the thick gathering of trees that surrounded the bungalow. She didn't feel the same way. Owen had been so sure that that had been something that had been on her mind too due to her reactions to their son's mention of his 'little sister' that he still pretended was around him. She had stopped telling the three year old to quit addressing his 'little sister' and instead asked him questions about what his 'little sister' was like. It was as though she had been imagining what a life with another child was like.

Owen took a deep breath, and spoke slowly, hoping that saying more wouldn't make things worse, "But it depends on you. We can start trying for a baby if and when you want to. I don't want you to feel that just because it's something I want, that you should want it too-" but before he could say anything more he heard the notepad drop to the flood as he felt his girlfriend's cool hand cup his warm cheek. She pulled his face towards her and placed a big kiss on his lips. This was enough of an answer to know that she felt the same way, and he smiled, a smile that grew as he felt her smile against his lips too. Before long the kiss had broken and he heard his girlfriend whisper, "Of course I want to"

Owen's heart soared. She wanted to start trying for a baby too. They were going to have another baby. A little Claire or another little Owen. A companion for Nathaniel who was already so ready to have a little brother or sister. Owen put his arm around his girlfriend and they cuddled up together, looking out at the peaceful environment around them, listening as the heavy rain still drenched the island. This was what perfection felt like. Sat in a peaceful location with the most beautiful woman in the world. Owen heard his girlfriend let out a heavy content sigh. His girlfriend. Girlfriend. Owen's heart began racing. This was it. This would be the perfect moment to propose. It was exactly how she had said she wanted him to propose. Just the two of them, alone, but together. He was going to do it.

"Claire?" Owen asked, and his girlfriend let out a happy "mmm-hmm?" but she didn't sit up. Owen could feel the palms of his hands becoming sweaty with nerves. He brought his arm from around her shoulders which made her sit up, and his heart continued to race as she looked at him with a furrowed brow, "What's going on?" she asked him but Owen couldn't look at her, instead staring down at his hands. He scoured his memory for the words he had been rehearsing in his head over and over for days now but for the life of him he couldn't remember what they were any more. And they had been the most perfect words. "Owen?" his girlfriend's voice sounded worried, and he looked over at her. Her expression now matched the concerned tone of her voice.

"Claire, I…" he paused, then stood up suddenly, taking her hand. She stood up to face him, her brow furrowed in confusion. He tried to smile, but he was so nervous that it was taking all of his energy to not pass out, so he stared down at his feet instead. This wasn't like him, and he could tell that Claire knew something was up. He felt her bring her hands up to his face, her short height becoming apparent as she glazed her fingers over his cheeks trying to get him to look at her, "Owen, what's wrong?" and he looked up. She looked terrified. He didn't want her to feel terrified. So he brought his hands up and pulled her hands away from his face, "Claire there's something I want to ask you" He finally let out a small smile as he saw his girlfriend freeze in shock. She knew what was coming. Deep down she knew. He reached into his pants pocket and pulled out the little black box. As soon as Claire spied it he saw her take a sharp intake of breath, cocking her head slightly, her eyebrows raised as she pursed her lips together. She looked up at him, her eyes already beginning to well up with tears. Owen took a deep breath and opened the little black box as he got down on one knee, revealing the diamond ring to the love of his life, "Claire Michelle Dearing, will you marry me?" and as he completely expected the woman burst into tears, blubbering a "yes". He stood up just as she lunged for him, throwing her arms tightly around his neck and kissing him passionately on the lips. To his horror he heard a small 'clink' and realised that in the motion of wrapping his arms around her the ring had fallen out of the little black box. The couple quickly pulled apart, and he heard Claire begin to flap, "Oh my God, Owen, I'm so sorry! Where is it? Have I lost it already? Trust me to have lost it already and I've not even worn it yet!" Owen chuckled as he knelt down on one knee, picked the ring up, then motioned for Claire to hold out her left hand. He placed the ring on her finger, and she gasped as she held it up to her face, "It's so beautiful!"

"You like it?" he asked as he stood up. This was the next nerve-wracking part of the whole proposal process. Hoping that Claire liked the ring. But the woman looked up at him, tears still running down her cheeks as her beautiful wide smile beamed up at him and Owen knew instantly that this had been the perfect proposal she had been hoping for, "I love it" she said, and without any further thought she threw her arms back around his shoulders. The couple kissed intensely for several minutes before the tension became too much for them and Claire straddled Owen's hips, letting him carry her into the bungalow and through to the bedroom.


	44. An Exciting Announcement & Future Plans

Claire sat in the warm meeting room of her office building. Three of the four walls boasted large windows that revealed the bright October sunshine and a strong blue sky. She twirled her pen between her fingers impatiently, staring at the TV screen opposite her as she waited for the satellite link to connect. The Board were late in starting this meeting. The meeting that they had asked her to do in the first place. The link would not connect until they answered it at their end, from their office in New York. Claire glanced down at her left hand and ran her thumb across the underside of her engagement finger with a small smile, enjoying the feel of the ring that was still so alien against her skin. It had been three weeks since Owen had proposed to her, completely out of the blue. She still smiled thinking about how perfect his proposal had been. Nothing grand or attention seeking. Nothing involving their family, their son, or their raptor. It had just been the two of them, alone. Perfection. And now of course they were planning on adding to their little family. Claire's heart dropped a little as she thought about it, the knowledge that due to the way her body worked it may take them a long time to conceive a baby. Not that Owen had considered that at first.

The rain continued to hammer down on the tin roof of the small bungalow, but the couple that had once been outside in the rain were no longer there. Claire let out a long content sigh as she lay naked in bed, her right arm lolled over Owen's bare torso, her left arm between their bodies, the thumb of her left hand glazing across the underside of the engagement ring she had on her finger. It felt so alien against her skin but she let out a smile. He had proposed to her. He had actually proposed. They were officially engaged! The memories she had of his proposal no more than an hour earlier filled her mind and she closed her eyes to make them more vivid. She felt Owen delicately glaze the fingers of his right arm over the large scar that remained on her back, bearing a permanent reminder of the hell they had once been through together.

Claire heard Owen let out a content sigh, before she felt him place a kiss on top of her head. She wrenched her eyes open as the silence in the room was broken by a loud rumbling noise that came from her stomach. She felt Owen bring his face from her head to look at her in surprise, and Claire brought her right hand up to cover her face in embarrassment. "Subtle hint that maybe I need to go and make us some dinner?" she heard him chuckle. Claire let Owen gently pull her hand from her face as they giggled and she looked up at him, mirroring his affectionate smile, "I love you" she heard him say quietly and her heart skipped a beat. She never grew tired of hearing him say it. "I love you too" she said quietly back to him, and she strained her neck to place a kiss on his lips.

To her surprise she felt him bring his left hand down to place on her stomach and she furrowed her brow slightly as he broke their kiss with a grin, "Who knows," he said, his expression looking softly at her, "we may have just made another baby." Claire raised her eyebrows with a little sigh, "Owen…" She could tell that her lack of smile had taken Owen by surprise. She gently took his hand from her stomach and returned it to his, "It took us months to get pregnant with Nathaniel. Remember?"

"So?" she heard him protest slightly and she kept her eyebrows raised but looked at the wall behind him, trying to find the right words to help explain how she was feeling, "So…I don't want us getting our hopes up when it may take us another several months to get pregnant." To her slight annoyance, he persisted, and brought his hand back to her stomach, "You don't know that it'll take that long again".

Claire sat up, swatting his hand away as she moved, and leant her left hand on the space of bed below his outstretched right arm as she stared down at him with a frown, "Owen, I know my body. My body is incapable of a lot of things that a normal woman's is. Like conceiving a baby for example." She had begun moving her hand around as she explained without realising. And as she did so, Owen had the expression of a man who had been caught by surprise. His eyes were wide, his expression moulded into one that made him look sad, "We have Nathaniel?" he said despondently, giving a perfectly good example of how she was wrong. But Claire washed over it, her hand moving slightly more frantically as she spoke, "Yes but Nathaniel was some sort of…miracle baby. He's a miracle! My body, somehow, decided to wake up and allow me to fall pregnant to with him. But what if it doesn't wake up again? What if we spend months and months and months trying for a baby and I never fall pregnant?"

Before she could take another breath, Owen took her waving hand, gave it a little tug, and she lay back down beside him with a heavy sigh. "I just…what if I can't get pregnant again? What if we can't have another baby?" she muffled into his chest as she felt him wrap his strong arms around her supportively. She paused, then whispered with a sigh, "I don't want you to ever resent me."

"I have never, nor will I ever resent you." she felt Owen kiss the top of her head hard and she closed her eyes, comforted by his hug, his affection, and his words, "You and me, we're a team. Whatever life has in store for us, we tackle it together alright?" and Claire nodded, comforted once again by the feel of Owen glazing his fingertips across the scar on her back.

Claire looked up from her engagement ring as a 'ping' sounded from the TV screen opposite her, and there on the screen was an image of her four bosses, sat in a row at a desk. They were all looking at her from the screen and she could tell by their body positons that they could see her via the satellite images projected onto their screen in New York.

"Good morning Claire. Thank you for agreeing to meet with us." Richard began, and Claire felt nervous. She had no idea what this meeting was about. It had all been rather short-notice. Usually the short-notice ones were a sign of bad news to come. "No problem at all" she replied. She began twirling the pen between her fingers once again, trying to combat any nerves.

"And if the rumours are true, congratulations on your engagement to Mr Grady." Claire could feel herself blush. It had been three weeks since she and Owen had got engaged but neither of them, nor The Park, had formally announced it. Right now the press were running on 'sources close to Jurassic Park' which usually meant one of the waiters at the restaurant had heard it from someone, who had heard it from someone, who had probably overheard Melanie mentioning it to someone else, in passing, in an un-enthused tone as Melanie often did, as though Claire had done yet another thing that would mean she was even less involved in the running of The Park and the Assistant Park Manager would have to step-up again.

"Thank you" Claire said politely, her thumb immediately glazing the underside of her engagement finger. The head of The Board, Richard, continued optimistically, "Shall we make a formal statement? Perhaps invite some of the press along to interview the two of you-?"

"That won't be necessary." Claire immediately interjected, "Owen and I will be announcing it on our social media account tonight, which The Park's publicity team will repost tomorrow morning." The Board looked pleasantly surprised by her proactivity on such a personal matter, but Claire was relieved that any rumours would soon be confirmed (or denied, depending on what certain reports said). And it was all thanks to her sister.

"You need an Instagram account." Claire scrunched up her nose at her sister's words, as she peered through her reading glasses at a new article online that speculated her and Owen's engagement, and held the phone to her ear. It had been six days since Owen had proposed. Since then the couple had been caught up with work and taking care of their son that they hadn't had much opportunity to think about their engagement let alone their wedding. Karen had been thrilled at the news of course. As had Owen's family when he had told them. Somehow the media were already beginning to speculate about the couple's engagement and Claire wondered how many of her employees had snitched to the news stations. "What's Instagram and why do I need it?" Claire asked, pushing her reading glasses a little further up her nose, before Googling 'Instagram'.

"It's a photo-sharing app. You take a photo, put a filter on it to make it look professional, add a couple of hashtags as a description, then share it with the world." Claire clicked on the link and opened up the Instagram website. It didn't seem like much. Sure the photos looked pretty, but she still wasn't sure why she needed it in her life. And as though she read her sister's mind, Karen continued to talk, "It's the easiest way for you and Owen to contact your fans without having to contact each of them personally. They can get a glimpse into your lives with your permission. So less hassle from fans. Less hassle from photographers. Because the photographers will never be able to get better photos of you than you. Get it?"

Claire wasn't sure she did, and had fallen upon the account of Lousia White, the actress who had shot some promo ads for The Park before now. She seemed to have posted photos of herself in the car, on a plane, on set. Each photo appeared to have been commented on hundreds of times, with many commenting on how beautiful she looked, and sending her love from whichever country they were in. Claire grinned. This was fantastic. She could contact the world from this app, with just a photo and a short description.

"So, I was thinking, this would be the perfect way to officially announce that you're engaged. You just, post a photo of you and your engagement ring, say something like "He popped the question" or "Future Mrs Grady" or something, and then your fans will know that it's definitely true. No need for big sweeping interviews, press conferences, or tonnes of statements. Just a photo." Claire looked up from her iPad and looked around the lounge that she sat in, her feet curled up under her as she sat on the couch. But she wasn't paying attention to the contents of the room. Nor the sound of Owen stepping into the kitchen from out in the back porch, having been outside to put out the BBQ now it was dark. She was trying to think if there were any photos that they had taken of her with her engagement ring on. But they hadn't really. They hadn't had much time to think about it.

"Claire, are you there? What do you think?" Claire jumped at the sound of her sister's voice and cleared her throat with a smile, "I think it's a great idea Karen. I'll chat to Owen about it and we'll see if we can set one up and come up with the right photo." She could practically hear her big sister's eyes roll from down the phone. The youngest sister was a perfectionist. Not as bad as she had once been, but she still maintained some standards about the way they were presented to the public.

Claire saw Owen make his way into the lounge and take a seat beside her, the notepad and pen from last weekend in his hands. The pros & cons list that they had made had been re-written and discussed by the couple. They were going to leave the island. That much they knew. They would take their time in doing so. Claire would announce her resignation to The Board within a few weeks' time, when she felt the time was right. For now though, they needed to think ahead. Where would they move to? What would their careers be once they were there? They hoped they had enough time to get it all figured out before they lost the house that they would inevitably lose by the time Claire finished running The Park. After all, it was included with her job.

Claire took a deep breath as the conversation with her bosses lulled to a silence. She swallowed loudly, her heart-rate increased to the point that she was almost certain it was missing several beats at a time. This was it. She was going to tell them she was resigning. It wouldn't come as any surprise to them of course, seeing as she was only in the office two days a week now and not as frequent on the emails as she had once been, her second in command Melanie now being the keen communicator. Melanie deserved the promotion to Park Manager. She basically did the role now as it was.

As Claire opened her mouth to speak, Richard, Head of The Board spoke, "Right, well, I'm sure you're wondering why we called you into this meeting. We have something very exciting to announce that we would like you to be involved in." Claire cocked her head slightly, furrowing her brow suspiciously. She hadn't expected them to announce something to her, let alone something exciting.

"We're broadening Jurassic World to the wider world." Claire still had nothing to say. What did they mean by broadening?

"We're opening two new Parks. One in Tasmania, and one in Madagascar." Claire's heart fell. What did this have to do with her? Surely they weren't going to ask her to move herself and her little family all the way to Tasmania! She knew she didn't do too much here on Isla Nublar, but it would be impossible for her to run yet another build and start-up of a new Park at a location so far from what she, Owen and Nathaniel had become accustomed to here. And Owen. What about Owen? Would they be expecting him to stay here with Blue?

"Now, you may be wondering what this has to do with you. Don't worry, we're not asking you to go over to Madagascar or Tasmania to oversee the construction. Construction is already under way." Claire breathed a sigh of relief, but still she remained frozen. What could they possibly be expecting her to be involved in?

"We're going to have a training programme for each of the assets that will be at these Parks. Just like the Raptor Training programme." Claire's heart lurched. So instead of sending her to those Parks they were going to send Owen? He would be away for weeks, perhaps months at a time. She would never be able to cope with that.

"Claire," one of The Board said, and she focused on the screen. For some reason the men were smiling. Kindly. They were smiling kindly. "We're going to set up a school in California. Where the weather is reliable and the land is open. And we'd like you to run it Claire. We'd like you to be the Principle." Claire felt numb. She was in shock. The worry that they were going to send her or Owen away, that they were going to break her family up all for the sake of a few dinosaurs, had struck fear into her heart. Now though, they were offering her the very opportunity that she and Owen had planned to take in the first place. They had planned to leave Isla Nublar and move to California. Where the weather was still hot and so they were closer to Owen's family. They had the money for a grand house and cars. To send Nathaniel to a really good school. They didn't even need to work. But now, from the sounds of things they already had jobs. Well, Claire did.

"And Owen?" she asked but the members of The Board didn't look uncomfortable at the mention of his name. Far from it. "We would like Mr Grady to become Head of the Raptor Training Programme at the school." Claire hesitated. More Raptors? She knew Owen could do it. But the implications of having even one un-trained Raptor was a big risk. "Now we plan to have five different species of trained dinosaur at each Park. We've limited the carnivores to two species: Velociraptors and Metriacanthosaurus'. The herbivores will be Pachycephalosaurus', Parasaurolophus', and Gallimimus'. They will be grown in eggs in one of our labs in China. The herbivores are all pack animals so each student will be assigned with three. The carnivores, we decided, should be limited to one per student."

Claire took a double take, holding her hand up for a moment, "I'm sorry, the students will be assigned dinosaurs?" She didn't like the sound of that. The idea of fifty dinosaurs was a difficult enough idea, but putting a bunch of kids in danger seemed like a big risk too, "How old are these students going to be exactly?"

"We thought yourself and Mr Grady could decide on that. Of course potential students should be chosen through application and recommendations. Experience working with animals would be ideal. If they are under the age of eighteen they would require formal education too so…we would recommend you ensure applicants are eighteen and above."

Claire was still relatively stunned as she processed all of the information. So, she would be in charge of several trainers, handlers, students, security, and dinosaurs. Much like being in charge of The Park but more specialised to training rather than performing.

"You would, of course, have a house within the school's grounds. A couple of cars, one for you and Mr Grady. You would both still have good paycheques. We can even fund your son to be home-schooled if necessary." Claire nodded slowly. At least they were reasonably allowing her family to stay together. "What do you think?"

Claire felt put on the spot. She didn't really know what to think. Personally it was everything that she and Owen needed. Professionally it was the change they needed. But she couldn't reveal any of her thoughts and fears to her bosses until she had spoken to Owen about it all. She could tell by the expressions on The Board's faces that they were desperate to have her agree to the new position. But before long, the pause had become too much for them and Richard cut the silence, "How about you go away and think about it. Talk it over with Aaron-"

"-it's Owen" Claire immediately corrected.

"Yes…Owen. Talk it over with him. If you have any specific questions that you're desperate to ask us then send one of us an email. Otherwise, think about it. Decide whether we've covered your personal needs. If we haven't then let us know what else we can do to make this offer more enticing… Claire, there is nobody we would want in this position but you. So work with us to make it a reality."

Claire couldn't believe her ears. All her hard work here at The Park over the years had paid off. They were desperate not to let her go. They must have sensed she was considering standing down as Park Manager. She was now in the very fortunate position to ask for anything she or her family wanted and, so long as she would take the position, they would give it to her. She decided to do as they said and think about it. "When do you envision this all happening?"

"We're aiming for Jurassic World in Tasmania to open in 2026. Then the trained dinosaurs will hopefully be filtered in from then. Jurassic World in Madagascar for 2029." Claire gulped. That was a nine year commitment to Jurassic World for her and Owen. They would be forty eight years old by then. She felt blood drain from her face. Their son would be twelve by that time. She wouldn't be surprised if Owen would have Nathaniel helping him with some of the training by then, much like he did now.

"So two intakes of students. One intake for Tasmania. Then once they leave the next intake will be for Madagascar." The Board continued to try to paint a clear picture of their plan, "In that time the students will imprint on their dinosaurs. Be there when they hatch. The herbivore students will work together, grouped in species, to learn how to take care of them and train them out in the paddocks, then learn all about their species in the classroom too. The carnivore students will do the same, but work in groups within their specific species, to avoid any aggressive attacks between the dinosaurs." Claire's stomach twisted. She didn't like the idea that the dinosaurs would attack each other. She remembered the horror she had felt when she had been told that the I-Rex had eaten its sister all those years ago. She didn't want another situation like that.

"If all of this goes well then we may consider rolling out another training programme following the Madagascar intake's graduation." The Board seemed thrilled with their plans but Claire still felt numb. It all seemed great on paper, considering the financial gain two new Parks would bring. But there was so much risk. Risk to life. Risk to the success of these programmes. "So, if Owen and I agree to this offer. When would you expect us to start?"

"If you agree we would like for you to move to the school this coming Spring, to oversee construction of the paddocks. Whilst there you can begin advertising for applicants, or you can organise a team to scout out potential applicants? We think the programme should stretch no longer than three years, so we would ideally like the school to open in 2023." Claire took a sharp intake of breath. That would give her two years to get her head around everything. The organisation it would take to start a school, something which she had no idea about. The construction of the training paddocks which would be paramount. They would no longer be on an island. They would be in mainland America. If any of these dinosaurs escaped it would be a devastating disaster beyond that of the Park Disaster of 2015.

The expectant date to move to California was far sooner than either she or Owen had planned. It would mix their decisions up a bit. Like whether now really was the right time to be trying for another baby. Or whether they should get married sooner rather than later. And Nathaniel? He would be six by the time the school opened. He needed to be in a regular routine with a teacher by then, if he were to be home-schooled. "Let me think about it" she said firmly, to which The Board obliged.

"Take as much time as you need."


	45. Shoe Polish

The morning light filtered through the window, beyond the netted curtains, and into the posh hotel room. The rays of sunlight danced off the small crystal chandelier that hung from the ceiling. The room, which had once been a hubble of action mere minutes earlier, was now silent and empty, except for Claire. She stood before a long mirror, letting out a sigh that she hadn't realised she had been holding in. Her green eyes inspected her appearance. The dress actually fitted her far better than she had anticipated. Thank goodness. She smoothed down the fabric at the front and let out a small smile as her engagement ring picked up the rays of sunshine, making it glisten. It really was the most perfect ring.

"What are you up to?" she heard Owen ask quietly, as he made his way into the bedroom, closing the door behind him. Several hours earlier she had been given the job offer of a lifetime by her bosses. The opportunity to become the Principal of a Dinosaur-Trainer Academy. And in the most perfect of locations too. California. And to top it off they were wanting Owen to work their too, as the lead teacher of the Raptor department at the academy. But that hadn't been the only thing she had discussed with her bosses. They had learnt of her and Owen's engagement, to which she had told them that she would announce the news publicly very soon. So that was what she was now doing. Sat up in bed, her glasses on her face, in the late evening, at home.

She casually swiped her finger from right to left on her iPad with her right hand. Her left hand was occupied by delicately sweeping back her son's fringe, slowly repeating it time and time again. Nathaniel Grady had fallen asleep half way through the second story book she had been reading to him, and seeing as he looked so peaceful she hadn't considered waking him to take him to his own bed. Instead she utilized the time to flip through all the photos she knew she had of herself and Owen together, to try to find the perfect one to edit and place on Instagram as an official 'announcement' of their engagement. She'd only recently got into the swing of Instagram, which was apparently an old social media app, but still a very popular one.

"I'm just trying to find the perfect photo of us…" she replied in a quiet voice, her eyes not moving from the screen. She paused on a photo that she loved, and let out a small smile. She heard Owen mumble something to her from the edge of his side of the bed, but she wasn't listening. The photo she was looking at was one their son had taken of them last week. Who would've thought that their three year old actually had quite an eye for taking a good photo?

"Claire?" Claire looked up from her iPad and over at Owen, who stood beside his side of the bed, in his vest and boxers, his eyebrows raised as though waiting for an answer. "Huh?" she asked, her cheeks flushing slightly, embarrassed that she hadn't heard what he'd said.

"I said, do you want me to take him to his room yet?"

"Not yet," she replied, looking down at the three year old affectionately. The little boy was sprawled out, taking up half the bed so that Owen would be left with no more than a bum-cheek's worth of space. Normally Claire would say yes. And normally if she said 'no' Owen would object. But since the invasion of privacy that the little family had experienced over the past few weeks, the parents were reluctant to be separated from their son. Particularly at night. This was why they mostly spent their evenings tucked up reading stories to their son in the master bedroom, until the little boy fell asleep. Then the parents would chat. Before they too would fall asleep. Some nights Owen would take Nathaniel to his bedroom to let the little boy sleep independently. Those nights were the nights Claire lay awake, listening out for any peep her little boy made through the baby monitor.

Claire gently leant closer to her son, wrapping her arms around his little body, and pulling him closer to her. She froze as he grumbled a little and the parents held their breath. No matter how much they loved their son they didn't have the energy to be entertaining him at this time of night. When she felt confident that she had left Nathaniel long enough, she continued scooping him towards her until Owen had enough room to lay on the bed. She unwrapped her arms from around her son, then showed her fiancé the photo she liked.

"What about this one? For the announcement" she asked, watching his reaction. To her relief she saw a soft smile spread across Owen's face. She could tell he liked it as much as she did. "Perfect" he said.

Claire admired the handiwork that the hairstylist had done. Her red hair was now in a plat along the left side of her head, and tied into a loose bun on the right side. She didn't think she had ever had it done so nicely before now.

Claire reached across to the dresser beside the mirror, and picked up one of the earrings from its surface. She delicately placed into her earlobe, not wanting to damage the jewellery that she knew had cost a lot of money. She paused, bringing her hands down and looking at her face now it had an additional accessory on one side. A smile brushed over Claire's face as she realised just how right her sister had been. Big earrings really did suit her. She rolled her eyes, making a note not to tell her sister that she had been right. As Claire reached out for the other earring she furrowed her brow slightly. Things really were a little too quiet.

"Nate, sweetheart?" she called out as she began putting the other earring through her earlobe. She had last seen her son sat in the corner playing with a toy X-Wing Fighter, zooming it through the air above him whilst making blaster sounds. But that had been when the hairstylist, her sister, and her nephews had been in the room. Now they were gone, and as far as she had been aware her three year old had not gone with them.

"Yeah?" she heard her son's little voice reply from the en-suite of the hotel room. Claire still furrowed her brow. His tone sounded…guilty. As though he were up to mischief.

"What are you up to?" she asked hesitantly, as she tried to adjust one of the hair clips that the hairstylist had left strategically in her hair. She heard something fall to the ground of the en-suite, followed by an "uh-oh" from her son. Claire's stomach dropped and she dashed over to the doorway of the en-suite. There, in the middle of the posh small tiled room, stood her three year old, wearing a sharp white tux and a guilty expression. It took all of the mother's self-control not to let out a blood-curdling scream, so instead she yelled his name, in dismay more than anything, "Nathaniel!" Her son held a tin of black shoe polish in one hand, and a filthy shoe brush in the other. But that wasn't the thing she was most horrified about. It was evident that the crash had likely been from the tin of polish, and now a thin black smear ran down the length of the front left panel of Nate Grady's little white tux. To make matters worse, the polish was all over her son's fingers, over his face, all over his once white socks, and the base of his little white trousers. He'd even managed to get a bit in his blonde hair that she had so lovingly crafted with gel first thing that morning!

Claire could feel the blood drain from her face as she began to panic. What should she do? Her immediate reaction was to lunge for her son, swipe the filthy items from his grasp, and immediately chuck him in the shower. The problem was it was only twenty minutes until the ceremony, and she couldn't risk going anywhere near him for fear that he would get the shoe polish on her dress too. Nathaniel knew he was in the wrong, his face turning sad and apologetic the moment his mother had caught eyes on him.

"Okay," she said rather breathlessly, holding her finger out at her son, "Don't move an inch." Claire turned immediately on her heels, and lunged for her cell that was on the bedside table nearest to her. As she called her fiancé she prayed that his cell wasn't on silent already. There was nobody else she could possibly call to help her fix this mess.

"Claire?" she heard him answer. But the moment she heard his voice her heart began racing and her anger suddenly flared up, "Owen Grady, you need to come and sort out your son right now!"

"Claire, what's going on?" she heard him asked. He sounded confused, perhaps even a bit worried, but she didn't care. This was all his fault. "Come and see for yourself!" she replied, pacing back over to the en-suite. Their son still stood motionless and guilty, shoe polish remaining all over him. Her blood continued to boil as she heard Owen sigh down the phone. How dare he sigh?

"Sweetheart, I'm on my way down to the ceremony room, can't you just…let him off the hook this one time? We can tell him off after the wedding, I promise." Claire could barely breathe she was that stressed. How could she possibly let Nathaniel off the hook? He had looked so wonderful and handsome and clean earlier. She had taken her eyes off him for no more than ten minutes and this was the state she had found him in! If anything she was angry with herself. She should know better than to let her monkey of a son go anywhere unsupervised.

"Well at this rate I may just call the wedding off because there is no way we can show our faces with him being in the state that he's in-" she burst, but she was interrupted by Owen who was beginning to sound like he was pleading with her, "Claire, you can't just call off the wedding. You don't have the-"

"Try me Owen!" She said it sharp and clear. Determined. She would stop this wedding if she had to. The room went quiet and Claire could tell by the pause down the phone that she had won. Owen let out a sigh, "Okay," he said in a defeated voice, "I'm on my way up to the hotel suite. I presume that's where you are?" She didn't appreciate his sassy few words at the end there, and so she ended the call. He would be here in a matter of minutes. She glanced over her shoulder at the clock. There was seventeen minutes to go.

Claire stared in disbelief at her son for a little longer before letting out a sigh, she would not be able to calm down until this problem was rectified, "Nate what were you thinking?" She asked, not expecting him to answer.

"I was 'poshing' my shoes like Daddy" he replied in his squeaky Californian/New York accent. An hour ago hearing the three year old saying 'poshing' instead of 'polishing' was adorable. Now Claire just grimaced. Of course he wanted to be just like Owen. This was why it was the father's fault. She watched in horror as her son began making his way towards her, his arms outstretched wanting a cuddle from her, but she leapt back and held her hands out defensively, "Stay where you are! Daddy will be here in a minute, then we can sort you out" she said, but she didn't sound so sure.

A low knock sounded from the door. Claire told her son to "stay put" as she went to answer the door, rolling her eyes slightly. Even Owen's knock sounded sulky. As she wrenched the door open she immediately stood back for her fiancé to enter the room. She saw his face open up in delight at her appearance, "Wow…Claire you look-"

But she didn't have the time nor patience to listen to his compliments, "Don't," she said sharply, walking from the door to the en-suite, "instead, why don't you take a look at what your son has managed to get his hands on." She couldn't bear to look at the three year old again and instead stood by the en-suite door with her left hand on her hip, her right hand motioning to their little boy. Sure enough, the moment Owen had cautiously crept into the room and caught sight of Nathaniel, the colour drained from his face. "We have fifteen minutes until we have to be down there Owen. What the hell are we going to do?"

"Well we need to get the shoe polish off him for a start" Owen said matter-of-factly, and he gave Claire a look that made her anger boil to the surface again. That look that he gave her only when he thought she was being entirely unreasonable. It wasn't a look that he dared to give her often, because when he gave it to her she didn't respond positively to it.

"Well I'm not taking it off him." Claire said, folding her arms stubbornly. She watched in disbelief as Owen squared up with her, his hands on his hips, "Well I'm sure as hell not."

"Owen, please, this dress cost far too much money. I can't have it ruined by some black shoe polish!" she protested.

"Hey this tux is pretty pricey too. Plus it's white, which our son has already proved does not mix well with black shoe polish!"

Claire fumed as she saw her fiancé motion at her dark green dress. So it wasn't white like their tuxes? It didn't mean she should be the one to go on the front line here and risk getting covered in shoe polish. Think of the wedding photos. Claire grimaced. The media would somehow get their hands on photos from today, and if any of the three of them looked unpresentable they would be scrutinized. Her more than any of them. To the world, Owen was a cheeky, lovable Raptor Trainer who was expected to be a little unpresentable. But Claire? Well to some of the world she was deemed as strict and uptight, someone who could slip-up at any moment because she seemed far too prim and proper. To others she was deemed the perfect mother who lived a perfect life with a handsome, perfect partner and an adorable, perfect son. Most of that was true, but no matter how much she hated to admit it, it really mattered to Claire how she was portrayed to the world. To her relief she heard Owen let out a slightly defeated sigh, "Okay, so say I do get the shoe polish off him, then what?"

"I don't know. Chuck him in the bath?"

"With his tux on? Wouldn't that defeat the whole purpose of me coming up here? I mean, we only have fifteen minutes, remember?"

"Only thirteen minutes now," Claire retorted, quick as a flash, and she glared at him, "so the sooner we come up with a plan the better!"

The bickering couple froze, staring at each other in horror for a split-second, as the tin of polish clanged onto the tiled floor. As their son went to pick it up the parents screamed at him to leave it. Owen lunged for Nathaniel grabbing him at arm's length and placing him in the dry bath tub. Claire in the meantime grabbed the toilet brush and pushed the tin of polish to the side of the ensuite so it could do no more damage. She told her son to remain where he was, and Owen dashed back into the hotel room, tugging his tux off, before returning to his son who was watching his parents in shock.

As Owen peeled the stained white jacket from around the three year old's shoulders he delicately handed it to Claire, who held it out at arm's length. "What should I do with it?" Claire asked in a panic-stricken voice. Her mind had gone blank. Owen had begun gently unbuttoning the sleeves of their son's immaculate white shirt, "Chuck it on the chair by the dresser." Claire obeyed, and by the time she had returned to the ensuite Owen had successfully rolled up their son's sleeves and plucked him out of the empty bath. "Grab me the soap" he ordered, to which Claire obliged, before watching her half-naked fiancé use the shower and soap to scrub their little boy's hands. "Oh, and we're going to need a sewing kit."

Claire glanced at the clock behind her. Only six minutes left. They were going to be late.


	46. High Fives & Mesmerising Green Eyes

Owen paced down the carpeted corridor of the hotel, trying to keep up with Claire who, despite being about half a foot shorter than him in the heels that she was wearing, was managing to walk very quickly indeed to the ceremony room. "Do you think Karen will notice?" he heard his fiancée ask him under her breath, and he looked from her, to their son perched around her right hip, then over at the three people they were approaching. "She'll be fine" he replied quietly. The chances were Karen would be far too focused on how late the little family were to worry about the state of her nephew, who still clutched to the small model X-Wing fighter that he rarely put down since being given it the week before.

"Where have you been?" the older sister hissed at her younger, and Owen noticed a familiar facial expression that he'd seen on Claire's face several times before. Clearly the Dearing sisters had similar temperaments when it came to stressful time-keeping. They stopped outside a set of doors, joining Karen, Zach and Grey. The young men were dressed in smart white tuxes like Owen and Nathaniel, and Karen wore a long white wedding dress. Owen had to admit they all scrubbed up pretty well. But none of them, in his mind, looked as stunning as Claire. Each time he looked at her his heart skipped a beat, hardly believing that she would one day be his wife. "Sorry. We had a bit of an accident" Claire said with an apologetic sigh as she placed Nathaniel on the carpet beside her and kissed her sister on the cheek.

Owen smiled as he watched Claire crouch down to their son, and delicately straighten his little bowtie, "Sweetheart, you have an important job today, remember?" she said to the three year old encouragingly. The young Grady was to lead them down the aisle where Michael would be waiting. And while many of the wedding guests, Owen included, wouldn't mind if Nate refused to walk down the aisle or even if he ran down the aisle, for Claire it would be the end of the world. The little boy nodded at his mother seriously, "I'm the leader" he piped up, and his parents both smiled, "That's right darling, you're the leader. You walk just how we practiced last night, and I'll be walking behind you" said Claire as she smoothed down the front of Nate's little white tux. Owen had to admit, he'd done a good job stitching the fabric so that the thin black line was far less noticeable and scruffy than it had been. And Claire seemed pleased enough with it. That was really all that mattered. Her happiness really was all that mattered to him. And he had been testing that happiness recently, particularly since agreeing to the Board's offer of becoming Head of the Raptor Training Programme at the school they were planning on opening in California.

Owen made his way from the top of the stairs of the house, taking a left, then walking quietly over to the master bedroom. He let out a gentle yawn, holding his hand over his mouth as he stifled it. It was late in the evening and he had had a long, busy day at Raptor Ranch trying to give his best friend and co-worker, Barry, as much freedom to take care of Blue as possible. The more Owen loosened the reigns on his senior trainers, the easier it would be for the whole team and the raptor when he would eventually leave. Leave. He couldn't believe that he was beginning to put into motion actions that were needed to ensure that his raptor was in good hands when he left. He never thought that day would come. But he knew why, and as he stood in the doorway of the bedroom he could also see the reason why.

There, sat up under the light covers of the king-size bed, lay his fiancée. He still wasn't quite used to calling her that. But that was her new official title in their relationship. Her features were highlighted by the small lamp on her bedside table, and the fairy lights that were still hanging around the room. Her red hair flowed past her shoulders, the natural waves evident having showered earlier that evening, and her reading glasses perched on the edge of her nose as she peered down at the screen of her iPad that lay on her knees. She was swiping through something on the screen with her right hand. To her left, sprawled out in an almost starfish position on his front, lay their three year old son. Nathaniel breathed heavily as he slept.

Owen slowly entered the room with another yawn, pulling off the vest that he had been wearing, exposing his tanned muscular torso. He noticed that Claire had brought her eyes away from the device momentarily and he grinned as he turned to close the bedroom door behind him, knowing that she was now watching his every move. "You wouldn't be checking me out now, would you Ms. Dearing?" he asked, flashing her a teasing grin. He watched her return her attention to her iPad, but noticed a smile grow across her face and, even in the dim light, he knew her cheeks had flushed in slight embarrassment. "Can't a woman look at her fiancé every once in a while?" he heard her ask rhetorically and he let out a quiet laugh. He looked from the grin on her face over to the bedside table beside her and saw her engagement ring lying on its surface beneath the lamp. His heart swelled at the sight of it, knowing just how proud he felt now that she had said yes to marrying him. They were to become a proper family. All Grady's. And they were going to be due another baby soon. Hopefully.

"Hey, have you managed to try another test?" Owen asked quietly, as he made his way over to his chest of draws, and pulled a draw open to find a pair of pyjama shorts. He could hear Claire let out a small sigh and he knew why. They had had several conversations over the past few days about getting pregnant. He knew that it wasn't going to happen right away. But it didn't mean that it wouldn't happen. For all they knew Claire could be pregnant right now, and they wouldn't know it until she took a pregnancy test. "Owen, I'm not taking another test just yet. I took two the other day!" he heard her say. He could tell from the tone of her voice that she wasn't in the mood for another 'but we might be pregnant' heated bicker that they had become accustomed to recently. Fortunately the bickering didn't last for long and the couple soon resumed whatever they had been doing in the first place as though nothing had been discussed at all.

The room went silent, except for Nathaniel's breathing, and once Owen had pulled his pyjama shorts on, he turned back to the bed. He smiled as he saw Claire looking down affectionately at their son, her left hand pushing the little boy's blonde hair back as she smiled. His heart skipped a beat as he saw them together, proud of how maternal Claire had become since giving birth to their son three years ago. He knew she wanted another baby as much as he did, and his stomach twisted with guilt that they hadn't got pregnant yet. The thing was, if they didn't fall pregnant soon then they would run out of time. Not because they were getting older, but that the time to move to California, to the new Jurassic World school, would soon be upon them. Then there would be no way there would be time for another baby. And this was something that was always on the couple's mind.

"What if we can't have another baby?" he heard her ask softly, sadly, whilst still looking down at their son. He felt a lump in his throat. He didn't really know how to answer. It wouldn't change how he felt about her. It wouldn't change how much he loved her or their son. Owen walked around to Claire's side of the bed, perching on the edge, and taking her hand as she turned to look at him. He stared into her green eyes that had filled with tears, the feel of the cool skin of her soft hand in his warm, rough hand reminding him of the first time he had formally met her. At the meeting that the company had held on the island. All those years ago. Back then she had been donned up in a smart white pant suit, her hair had been clipped up into a neat bun, and her makeup had been perfectly done. Now she sat before him, eight years later, wearing one of his t-shirts that hung off her slim body, her long red hair hanging down below her shoulders with a natural wave to it. She sat makeup-less, her freckles winding their way thickly from her nose, and across the tops of her cheeks. He had heard her commenting about the wrinkles that were forming around her eyes, but he couldn't understand what she was talking about because he never looked around her eyes when he was with her. He looked into them. They were a mesmerising bright green. As bright as the day he had first met her. Owen brought his hand up and wiped a tear that had dared to trickle down her cheek, and she leant into it. He held his hand there, caressing the skin of her cheek affectionately as she gripped onto his other hand. Their eyes were locked as he spoke softly to her, "We have Nathaniel. We have each other. If we don't have another baby then that's the way it is. But it's never going to change the way I feel about you."

Owen crouched down to his son's level, "Don't forget Nate, we're a team. So you lead Mommy down to me, yeah?" he held his hand held up slightly and the three year old grinned, giving his father a high-five, before turning to his mother and giving her a high five too. The only way that they had managed to get Nathaniel to walk down the aisle properly was by emphasising that he wasn't doing it for his Auntie Karen. Owen had created this story that the little boy had to imagine that by walking down the aisle with his mother following closely behind, that he would be reuniting his parents, because Owen would be at the end of the aisle as he was Karen's fiancé Michael's best man. "Right, see you in a moment" Owen said, shooting Claire a grin and a wink, before he dashed through the doors and into the ceremony room.

Claire stood up straight, smoothing down the front of her green Maid-of-Honour dress, before turning to her sister. "You ready?" the red head exhaled, and her sister grinned nervously with a small nod, "You look amazing!" she continued as Karen smoothed down the front of the white wedding dress nervously with a small shrug. Of the two Dearing sisters, Claire was far more confident than Karen, but that had not always been the case. The older sister had boasted a far wider range of friends than the younger when they had been growing up due to her confidence. She had been deemed the more attractive teen, with her long legs, slender figure, and blonde hair. Claire hadn't been blessed with those features and she had had to work hard as a late-teen and adult to maintain a relatively fit physique which had involved portion control and ridiculous hours spent with a personal trainer. As teens, Karen had been able to eat everything under the sun in one sitting and barely put on a pound. Claire had never been as fortunate as that. However, since the birth of her children, something seemed to change in Karen. Over time she began to lose her confidence. And while the older sister began losing her confidence, the younger sister began gaining it as she worked her way up the ranks in her career. Now it was Claire who was in the fortunate position of being the confident sister, with an excellent career. She still portion-controlled and did yoga when she could. But she was a far cry from the person she had been when she had first entered adulthood. "Karen," Claire began, taking her older sister by the shoulders, "You've done this before. You can do this again." She watched as her sister took a deep breath then broke into a smile, nodding slightly, "Yeah. I can do it. It's just a bunch of people."

"Exactly! A bunch of people who you know. There's not one person in that room that you don't know, Karen." Claire knew that this was just her sister's way of processing the upcoming situation. She didn't like being the centre of attention, unlike Claire who often thrived on it. Today was Karen's wedding day, she had no choice but to be the centre of attention. All of a sudden, Claire saw her son reach up and tug gently on his Aunt's white wedding dress. The women looked down to see the three year old holding up his small model x-wing fighter, "Auntie Karen, do you want to hold this?" Karen, who had clearly not expected this act of kindness from her young nephew, smiled, "Thank you sweetheart, but why don't you take care of it for me, just while we walk down the aisle?" Claire saw her son look up at her with a confused expression, "While we walk down to Daddy" the red-head explained with a soft smile. This was explanation enough for the young child and he nodded, bringing the small toy back to his body and keeping hold of it with both hands as he looked at it, "I'll take care of it for you" he agreed. Claire smiled as she turned back to her sister with a grin, "So, are you ready?" and the older sister nodded with a smile. This was it.


	47. The Designated Parent & A Wolf-Whistle

Claire stood patiently in the wedding reception room. When she had first entered the room a few hours ago, post-wedding ceremony, she had gazed in awe at the how pretty her sister had managed to make the room, despite it having been a rather dull function room the previous evening. Several round tables had been dressed in pristine white tablecloths, with a green and pale pink flower arrangement in the centre of each table. Classical music had been trickling through the speakers in the ceiling of the room, acting as background music while guests made their way to the bar and to their seats. Green balloons floated in the corners of the room, while bunting traced its way all around the edge of the walls. The red-head had been impressed. Considering Karen had only wanted a small celebration, she had managed to make the room look beautiful.

Claire now stood on the edge of the dancefloor, post-wedding meal, post-wedding speeches, while an animated twelve year old girl spoke to her. The girl, one of the groom's niece's, had tracked her down as soon as there had been an opportunity. "I love your dress" the girl said excitably, motioning to the green fabric and Claire smiled politely, "Thank you" she replied, "I love yours too" she motioned to the twelve year old's light blue dress and the girl let out a little excitable squeal, hardly able to believe that she had been complimented by her hero. Claire had been initially surprised by the little tug on her arm by the girl, who had introduced herself as Madison, before telling her that she was a huge fan of Claire's and the work she did at Jurassic World. The woman had been flattered, having forgotten recently just what an influence she had on impressionable young girls.

Claire automatically glanced at the dance floor, looking for her son, always keeping an eye on him whether she was aware of it or not. Her maternal instinct. The three year old was running around in large circles, clutching one of the green helium balloons, while one of his cousins, Grey, chased after him. Even with the sound of the music playing loudly from the DJ in the corner of the room, Nathaniel's infectious laugh could be heard as the little boy enjoyed playing with his cousin. Claire knew Grey's interaction with her three year old was for a reason, and she noticed the fifteen year old glancing over periodically with a grin at a teenage girl who was watching them from her position sat at a table on the edge of the dancefloor with a smile on her face. Claire had to hand it to him, he knew what he was doing. She looked back at Madison who had begun blushing and Claire's smile dropped slightly, curious to know if she'd missed something that would possibly make the twelve year old blush. But she soon had her answer when she felt the familiar touch of her fiancé's hand smooth its way across the small of her back, and she saw Owen out of the corner of her eye. "Er…Hi…" the girl said slightly flustered by the new arrival, but before the tall handsome man could respond, the twelve year old continued, "I have to go…er…bye!" and before the couple could say anything more, the girl dashed away. Claire chuckled at just how easily embarrassed teenagers and pre-teens got.

"Have I told you how beautiful you look?" Claire heard Owen whisper into her right ear. She felt a shiver run through her body from the part of her ear that she had felt his lips touch, and a smile grew on her face as she turned to face him, leaning towards his ear so he could hear her, "Once or twice. But certainly not in the past thirty minutes" she replied in a teasing tone, and her heart skipped a beat as she watched her fiancé throw his head back a let out a loud laugh which could just be heard over the music that was bouncing around the large room. Claire brought her wine glass up to her lips and took a swig of rosé. They had decided that morning that she would be the 'designated parent'.

Claire gently laid out her son's little white tuxedo on the armchair that sat in the corner of the bedroom in their hotel suite. She turned quietly to face the double bed, and a soft smile grew on her face. Owen was tucked up on his side of the bed, his bare chest lay uncovered but the bedsheet was wrapped around him from the waist down, and he was still fast asleep. Even five years on from the Jurassic World disaster of 2015 he still had the occasional nightmare. Sometimes Claire would wake because he would scream, or leap out of bed, and she would need to wake him to get him to stop and calm down. Sometimes he didn't even wake, and somehow calmed down in his sleep. Last night was one of those times. Claire had awoken, tried to shake him awake with no luck, and instead just kept repeating that he was okay until he calmed. Within an instant he had fallen back into a silent slumber, leaving the red-head with no choice but to lay awake staring at the ceiling. An hour later their son had joined them, thinking it was time to get up and get ready when, in fact, it was only 5am. So Claire had read a book to Nathaniel until the three year old had fallen back to sleep.

Claire looked at the bedside clock beside her sleeping fiancé. 7.30am. She turned back to the bed, smiling as she saw her son sprawled out in the bed, taking up most of the room, with his little foot up dangerously against his father's face. There was once a time, when Nathaniel was a baby, that she would wake when Owen went out for his morning run, and whilst he was out she would creep into her son's bedroom, scoop the baby up in her arms, and bring him back to bed with her. She missed those mornings. Laying curled up, watching her baby sleep. His tiny fingers gripping to a lock of her long red hair, his chunky little legs nestling perfectly into her stomach and just below her bosom, his baby cheeks squishing together as he rested his face against her chest. It was a very rare morning now that he came into the bedroom and snoozed with his parents. And it just so happened that this morning was one of those rare mornings. "Typical" Claire thought to herself, "The one morning when we really do have to get up and my boys are asleep."

"You're up early" she heard the groggy voice of her fiancé say to her. She saw him begin to open his eyes before jumping at the sight of their son's foot, which was less than an inch from his face. Claire let out a small chuckle before moving towards her side of the bed and laying on the mattress. She moved their son in the process, perfectly happy with the risk of him waking up. If he woke up, that meant they could begin to get ready. And if he didn't…well that meant they could all lay in bed a little longer. To the mother's delight, her little boy stirred momentarily, before curling himself up into her like he had done when he had been a baby. "Did I have a nightmare?" she heard her fiancé ask in an apologetic tone. Claire merely shrugged with a soft smile, "It's just one of those things" she said quietly, and she glanced down at their son who was still fast asleep, with a grip on a lock of her long red hair. She traced her fingertips lightly across the skin of her little boy's arms and back, loving the feel of his little chest rising and falling as he breathed in his sleep. Suddenly Nathaniel let out a little snore, paused, swallowed loudly, before resuming his sleep, and his parents chuckled quietly. The toddler was a ball of endless energy when he was awake. But when he was asleep, Claire and Owen loved to cherish that time, to watch him sleep and to marvel at how fast he was growing. It was usually about now that a discussion about hopes and wishes of having another baby became a top subject, and Claire looked up at Owen, expecting him to brooch the subject. But he didn't, instead looking up at her and giving her a slightly sadder smile. He'd read her mind. He too knew that now was often the opportunity to begin the conversation that ended in an argument. So instead the couple chose to continue the peaceful moment between them and their son in the early hours of the morning. It was going to be a very busy day.

"What are we going to do today about alcohol?" she heard her fiancé ask, and Claire furrowed her brow slightly, wondering what he meant. It made it sound as though they were raging alcoholics and they really weren't. "I don't mean, let's start drinking now" he said with a chuckle, and the red head smiled, secretly relieved that that wasn't what he'd meant. She thought she knew him well enough by now to know that that wasn't what he'd meant. "I mean…well this little guy is going to be with us all day," Owen said motioning to their son who still lay sleeping in her arms, "So one of us is going to have to be the more responsible parent." Claire furrowed her brow slightly, and looked down at Nathaniel. It hadn't occurred to her that one of them wouldn't be drinking today. Technically it was her sister's wedding so surely she should be the one allowed to drink. But then she was maid-of-honour, so she would need to be the sensible one. "So…like a designated parent?" she asked, then looked back up at Owen who had a soft smile on his face, "Sure. I'm not suggesting neither of us drink at all. I mean, come on, it's a celebration. Just…one of us needs to be the parent who doesn't drink that 'one more drink' that pushes them over the edge into being smashed." Claire's face fell, becoming serious as her fiancé let out a chuckle. Neither of them were getting 'smashed' today. Neither of them. At the end of the day it was her sister's wedding day. Not only were they going to be in the 'public eye' all day, but their son was still their top priority regardless of the celebration.

Owen had clearly noted her change in expression and immediately defended what he was saying, "Not smashed. Smashed was a bad word to use. Neither of us are getting smashed," Claire's expression relaxed into a 'you're right, nobody's getting smashed' type of expression, "I just mean, I think it's good to decide now in case we don't get to see much of each other today." That was the right thing to say and Claire nodded slowly, "Well I don't mind being designated parent" she said, but quickly followed sharply with, "I will be having some wine though." Owen nodded, pulling an 'of course' expression, before whispering, "And I will stick to beer. No shots of tequila."

Claire let out a giggle, the motion of which seemed to disturb their son and the parents froze. The three year old let out a little yawn, letting go of the lock of his mother's hair that he had had in his little hand, and he rubbed his eyes, rubbed his nose, then sat up to look around. "Mommy?" he said groggily, and Claire sat up, reaching out to try to tame the blonde bed-hair her son had at the back of his head, "Yes sweetheart?" she said softly. "Where's my fighter?" the little boy asked, and his parents chuckled at the first thing their son had said the moment he woke up. He wouldn't be without his toy 'fighter'. Owen sat up, reached out to the bedside table beside him, and picked up Nathaniel's small toy X-Wing fighter. The father swung the toy gently in the air, making the best X-Wing fighter noises he could, and he 'flew' the toy towards his son. Nathaniel laughed loudly, launching forward for the toy and grabbing it with both hands.

The couple stood on the edge of the dancefloor. Owen had now brought his hand up to Claire's face, delicately pushing a loose lock of red hair back behind her ear. She stared into his eyes as he smiled softly at her. For the first time in a long time the room around them seemed to disappear. For a moment Claire was unaware of anybody else in the room other than the man stood before her. She could feel her stomach flip as her eyes ran across his features, loving the sight of his chiselled jaw-line. She continued to look at him, glancing from his jaw, across to his chin, and down further. After a moment she realised she had been looking at his chest for a little too long, knowing just how good his body was underneath that white tuxedo which had miraculously avoided any food stains from the meal earlier. The woman looked back up at her fiancé and noticed that his smile had grown on his face. For some reason Claire began to blush, and she could feel her cheeks beginning to go pink. She had no idea how many beers Owen had had. In fact, she wasn't even sure of how many glasses of rosé she had had, but there was a high chance they had been cancelled out by the huge sit-down meal they had had earlier as part of the wedding celebrations. She only felt slightly tipsy. Not so tipsy that she couldn't take care of their son, mind. She glanced back over at Nathaniel, who was now dancing with Grey and the girl that the fifteen year old had been flirting with. They could watch the three year old for a few minutes right?

Claire turned back to Owen and held her empty wine glass out to him. As he took it he furrowed his brow, but Claire merely pursed her lips together into a cheeky grin. She stepped on her tip-toes and whispered into his ear, "Wait here for a moment then follow me to our suite". She delighted in seeing his eyes light up as she stepped away from him, holding her face close to his, pre-empting a kiss that never came. She knew it would drive him crazy, and with that thought in mind she shot him a wink, before slowly walking away from him and towards the door. Her heart was racing with excitement. Perhaps she had had a little more wine then she'd realised. As she reached the door that would lead her out of the room and towards the staircase that would lead her up the floors to her suite, she paused, glancing over her shoulder. Claire let out a giggle as she saw Owen looking over at her, desperately disappointed to have been stopped by one of her cousins who appeared to have not noticed the sexual tension between the couple. He would have to wait a little longer to get to her, she presumed, and she waved at him as she turned to walk out the door.

Claire's stomach dropped in disappointment as she heard her sister calling out to her. She wondered if she could get away with just dashing up the staircase that was almost in view, pretending to have not heard her, but Karen appeared behind her and took her hand, stopping the red-head in her tracks. "Claire I can't thank you enough for everything you've done!" the older sister gushed to the younger, "Oh Karen, really, it was nothing…" Claire said honestly. To her amusement she noticed that her sister had had quite a bit to drink. The older woman brought her hand up to her little sister's shoulder and patted it, "Nonsense. You…you were the mastermind behind it all…" Claire peered behind her sister and to her dismay she noticed that Owen had sprung free from the conversation her cousin had held him in, and he was now making his way towards the door. "…if it wasn't for you I would have never had the…confidence to walk into that ceremony room…and Owen…ugh he's just so perfect for you…" Claire could hear her sister beginning to compliment her fiancé, but she wasn't really listening as she watched Owen slip out of the door behind Karen, throwing the red head a cheeky grin and a wink as he waved at her then sauntered towards the staircase. Claire was too jealous and desperate to get to him for her to be annoyed with him for teasing her. "…I'm just so, so happy for you that you…ugh finally found someone." Claire needed to leave. As nice as it was that Karen was pouring her heart out to her, now really wasn't the time.

"Thanks Karen, but I really should be…" the red-head motioned to the staircase but the bride wasn't picking up on the hints, and instead Karen brought her voice down to a loud whisper as she took Claire by the arms, "I'm not going to lie, for a while I thought you were a lesbian." Normally the younger sister would be outraged, but then normally the older sister would be more reserved, "Right well…Karen thanks for that. I really do need to go though." Karen immediately let go of Claire's arms and gasped, her face falling, "Oh no, you need to go to the bathroom, and I've been over here jabbering away!" Claire shrugged, happy enough to make that the excuse to leave if that was what her sister was suggesting. The older sister lowered her voice to a loud whisper again, "Go! Go!" she hissed, looking up and down the hallway as though Claire was about to go undercover on a secret mission. Once Karen, in her alcohol-induced state felt the coast was clear, she gave her sister an obvious wink, before creeping back into the wedding reception room. Claire couldn't help the grin that was on her face. She had never seen her sister this drunk before. Well, certainly not in their adult lives.

Claire heard a wolf-whistle echo around the hallway, and she turned to see Owen dash back up the staircase behind her. With a small giggle to herself she scuttled away after him. Claire reached the top of the first flight of stairs and was surprised to see Owen stood there waiting for her. There was nobody else around, and the couple knew it. Without any further thought Claire strode towards Owen, who was already closing the gap. Their lips collided as they began kissing passionately. A mix of alcohol and sexual tension had helped release their inhibitions as Claire reached up to wrap her arms around Owen's neck while he wound his arms around her waist. Giggles emanated from their mouths as they heard voices coming up the staircase below and before Claire could gather her thoughts she felt Owen take her hand and pull her towards the next staircase. She gladly followed him, giggling as she went. They paused at the next floor, Claire bringing her free hand up to her mouth, her fingertips delicately tracing her nose, Owen's arm snaking around her waist as the couple glanced down the staircase, hoping the people below would not be walking up the next flight of stairs. But they weren't so lucky, and with another audible giggle, Claire allowed herself to be pulled up the next flight of stairs by Owen before the people on the floor below noticed them.

This time Owen did not wait to see the voices joined them, and Claire delighted in feeling his lips crashing back down on hers, the couple kissing eagerly as their hands traced each other's bodies above their respective clothes. Claire heard Owen growl silently in frustration as he heard a couple of voices coming down the corridor of the floor they were on, and the couple broke their kiss. Claire couldn't help grinning as she slipped her feet out of her precious heels, sinking down so she was far noticeably shorter than her fiancé, and bending down to pick her footwear up with one hand. The other hand she used to take Owen's, and this time she pulled him towards the staircase before the voices of the corridor reached them. The couple dashed up the final two flights of stairs, finally reaching the floor that their suite was on, and they planted kisses sloppily on each other's faces while they bumbled their way down towards their door. Claire reached into Owen's pocket, pulling out the hotel suite key, fumbling to unlock the door. Finally they pushed through the room, slamming the door behind them as they began to hungrily pull each other's clothes off.


End file.
